CALL FOR PAPERS Talking Heads Paper abstracts sought for proposed panel on documentary media and the talking head Visible Evidence Conference XII, Concordia University, Montréal, Canada August 22-25, 2005 Despite being one of the most commonly used devices in documentary media, the talking head has seldom been subject to sustained theorization or historicization within documentary studies. The talking head facilitates a wide range of speech acts (e.g. confession, testimony, interview, lecture, monologue), which often coexist within a single scene. Since this device functions as a fulcrum for many of the most significant dynamics in play within documentary representation (authenticity, truth, authority, intersubjectivity, performance), it has also become the focus of critical interrogation and self-reflexive experimentation by documentary filmmakers, including Trinh T. Minha (Surname Viet, Given Name Nam), Mark Achbar (The Corporation), Marlon Riggs (Tongues Untied) and, of course, Errol Morris. Furthermore, new media forms like video art, home video, webcams and digital installations have remediated the documentary conventions of the talking head into techniques and aesthetics which have subsequently influenced documentary film and television. This panel seeks to investigate the theoretical and historical complexity of the documentary talking head by bringing together a range of methodologies and approaches, including film studies, art history, performance studies, rhetoric, communications and cultural studies. Contributions from documentary makers also strongly welcomed. Email a 150-word paper abstract, brief bibliography/filmography and a short biographical statement to Roger Hallas ([log in to unmask]) by January 15, 2005. Visible Evidence is a peripatetic international and interdisciplinary conference on the role of film, video and other media as witness and voice of social reality, which encompasses a wide range of cultural, political, social, historical, ethnographic and pedagogical questions and perspectives from fields such as film studies, communication studies, anthropology, architecture, art history, ethnic studies, queer studies, history, journalism, law, medicine, political science, sociology, urban studies and women's studies. For general information on the conference: http://artsandscience.concordia.ca/comm/visibleevidence.html ---- To sign off Screen-L, e-mail [log in to unmask] and put SIGNOFF Screen-L in the message. Problems? Contact [log in to unmask]