Viral Movements Symposium

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A collaboration between the Weiss Chair in the Humanities, housed in Penn State’s College of the Liberal Arts, and the Communication, Science, and Society Initiative (CSSI), a partnership between the Penn State’s Department of Communication Arts and Sciences (CAS) and the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences, brings together humanists, social scientists, and life scientists for interdisciplinary engagement in provocative questions, compelling issues, new directions, or significant challenges that surround thinking about Viral Movements.  

Through a mix of plenary, breakout, and poster sessions, symposium participants will explore three themes: 

• (IM)Mobility addresses the dynamics of disease, literal and metaphorical, as they relate to borders, migration, and immigration;  
• (Mis)Management considers efforts to manage viral movements, of various sorts, and the challenges to doing so; and  
• (Mis)Information examines how information is disseminated, and the viral spread of misinformation.  

Leading the symposium are ten scholars, who bring expertise spanning rhetoric; women’s, gender, and sexuality studies; Latina/o studies; communication science; geography, entomology; and biology:  

Nita Bharti, Penn State University 

Karma R. Chávez, University of Texas 

Matthew Ferrari, Penn State University 

Heidi Lawrence, George Mason University 

Erika Machtinger, Penn State University 

Anthony C. Robinson, Penn State University 

Lijiang (L.J.) Shen, Penn State University 

Bradford Vivian, Penn State University 

Nathan Walter, Northwestern University 

Melissa W. Wright, Penn State University 

In addition, two dozen scholars or practitioners from other institutions have been invited to join the conversations. These individuals are working or intend to work toward advancing theory, research, and/or practice on one or more of the symposium themes.    

If you would like to participate in the symposium, please submit your information by May 3rd via this link: https://pennstate.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_6yXMpwLyVyAjbPU. The form will also provide a list of sessions, where you can indicate which sessions you plan to attend.  

All participants will also have the opportunity to participate in an informal poster session, where they discuss research topics or recent projects with others. If you would like to be included in the poster session – from 4:00-5:15 on Wednesday May 14th – please email the title of your research topic to James Dillard at jpd16@psu.edu. 

Inquiries can be directed to the symposium co-planners: Lisa Flores, Weiss Chair of the Humanities and Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences and Women’s Gender, and Sexuality Studies: lisa.flores@psu.edu; Denise Solomon, Distinguished Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences: dhs12@psu.edu; or James Dillard, Distinguished Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences: jpd16@psu.edu.