EXCITING NEWS Conference

On March 15th and 16th, 2021, the Irish Humanities Alliance (IHA) and the Euronews Project held the virtual conference entitled “EXCITING NEWS! Event, Narration and Impact from Past to Present."
The rich programme included over thirty presentations, organised into nine panels and followed by interesting and wide-ranging discussions. The speakers came from universities and research institutes in Ireland, Italy, Scotland, England, Wales, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic and Russia. In addition to its international scope, the conference was distinguished by its multidisciplinary approach, which made it possible to reflect on the phenomenon of news from various points of view. The papers discussed the many ramifications of media, from the early modern period to the present day; they ranged from history to literature, from communication studies and journalism to anthropology and folklore, from social sciences to literary criticism.
Jane Chapman, Professor of Communications at the University of Lincoln, gave an inspiring keynote lecture on the neglected voices embedded into the news sources and brought a reflection on how events can only be understood through an analysis of the collective consciousness.

The programme of the conference is available here.

Below, the recordings of the conference.

Introductions with:
Dr Niamh Nic Ghabhann (UL), Chair of the IHA
Prof. Chris Williams (UCC), Vice Chair of the IHA
Dr Mel Farrell, Director IHA
Prof. Brendan Dooley, UCC

Panel One: Circulation and Reception

Chair: Brendan Dooley (UCC)

Prof. Liam Mac Mathúna (emeritus, UCD), 'Tadhg Ó Neachtain: A Case-study in Gaelic Media Reception in Eighteenth-Century Dublin'
Dr Máire Nic an Bhaird (Maynooth University), 'Visions in Volumes'
Dr Brendan Twomey (TCD), 'Swift’s political pamphlets; medium, message, impact'
Dr Bláithín Hurley (Central Library, Waterford), 'MURDER! He Wrote: The News as Reported by James Ryan in his Diary (1787-1809)'

Panel Two: Early Modern News

Chair: Davide Boerio (UCC/IRC)

Dr Giovanni Florio (University of Padua), 'A demonologist in the ‘war of writings’: Strozzi Cicogna and the Venetian Interdict (1606-1607)'
Luca Marangolo (University of Naples Federico II), 'Narrative structures in the early modern system of news the neapolitan revolution of Masaniello and other cases'
Thomas Pritchard (University of Edinburgh), 'An Autopsy in Ink: The Pan-European race to Find the Truth of the 1625Raid Upon Cadiz'

Keynote Lecture

Prof. Jane Chapman, Professor of Communications, University of Lincoln, 'Challenges Beyond the News : the Rediscovery of Neglected Voices'

Panel Three: Roundtable: Balloons, Ballads, Boats, Bytes and Brexit: Irish Sea Media

with Prof. Claire Connolly (UCC), Prof. Mary-Ann Constantine (University of Wales CAWCS), Dr James L. Smith (UCC), Dr Jonathan Evershed (UCC), Dr Rita Singer (Aberystwyth), Dr Elizabeth Edwards (University of Wales CAWCS).

Panel Four: Troubling news in the Spanish Monarchy

Chair: Dr. Roseanne Baars (Univ of Amsterdam)

Dr. Domenico Cecere (University of Naples Federico II), 'Disaster news and scientific literature'
Dr. Alessandro Tuccillo (University of Naples Federico II), 'News of the 1688 Naples earthquake'
Dr. Milena Viceconte (University of Naples Federico II), 'News a Spanish Miracle'

Panel Five: Wars at Home and Abroad

Chair: Mel Farrell (IHA)

Prof. Chris Williams (University College Cork), 'Wonders of Science! The German Air Campaign against Britain, 1915-18 and British political cartoon responses'
Joel Herman (TCD), 'Using newspaper accounts of Irish, American, and British newspapers from 1760-1780, this paper investigates the transnational spread of ‘the news’ in the late eighteenth century'
Dr Brian Wallace (University of Manchester), 'The wars at home: Victorian imperial sieges and the conscription of public opinion'

Panel Six: Rumor and Belief

Chair: Alexander Wilkinson (UCD)

Dr Eamon Darcy (Maynooth University), ‘So many false reports are spread abroad that a man knows not what to believe’: “Fake” news and the Irish rebellion of 1641
Dr Rosanne Baars (University of Amsterdam), 'Rumour and News Credibility during the Early Years of the Dutch Revolt, 1568-1580'
Panagiotis Georgakakis (University of St Andrews), 'Media in wartime: Huguenot gazettes during the wars of King Louis XIV'
Dr Lena Liapi (Keele University), 'The land shakes and the heavens weep: natural disasters in early modern news'

Panel Seven: News and Multimedia

Chair: Finola O'Doyle (UCC)

Johana Kłusek (Charles University in Prague), 'Mediain Czechoslovakia: The 1938 scene'
Jakub Machek (Metropolitan University Prague), and Ondřej Daniel (Charles University Prague), 'No Exciting News - Anxiety-free Czechoslovak Media Soothing the Late Socialist Society'
Dr. Maria-Valeria Morris (Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration), 'Media portrayal of radical Irish Republicans and Irish rebel music: An anthropological perspective'

Panel Eight: Tales of the City

Chair: Andrea di Carlo (UCC)

Dr. Lorenza Gianfrancesco (University of Chichester), '"An Enemy of Peace": Viceroy Pedro Téllez-Girón of Osuna and the Neapolitan Public Sphere, 1616-1618'
Dr. Pasquale Palmieri (University of Naples Federico II), 'Two Tales of One City. Justice and Epidemics in 1764 Naples'

Panel Nine: Trouble in the Headlines

Chair: Eamon Darcy (Maynooth University)

Dr. Leanne Blaney (University of Glasgow), “What a Car Crash”
Daniel Carey (Dublin City University), 'Making a splash: a brief history of headlines'
Prof. Caitríona Ní Dhúill (UCC), 'Anxious updates in the Anthropocene: Narrating climate breakdown in recent European fiction'

Conference Conclusions with the Euronews Project's team

Chair: B. Dooley (UCC)