Each month, the MediaCommons Field Guide hosts a different conversation in Media Studies, Digital Humanities, and Culture Studies asking contributors to connect their interests or research to a core conceptual question. 

We are seeking contributors to shape diverse and intriguing conversations for our late March to mid-April issue, revolving around aura transference, (re)presentation, (re)production, cultural use values, circulation, digital rhetorics, and New Aesthetics, asking broadly: 

Where can we locate Walter Benjamin’s legacy in the digital to post-digital landscape? 

The responses we hope to compile in this issue need not be solely based around Benjamin's 1936 essay but can include (but are not limited to):

critical interpretations of historicism

translation

esotericism

image circulation

memetic flow

secularity

celebrity

democratization of art/the image

use/aura as mapped to our current media transitional landscapes

Many scholars elect to submit semi-formal essay responses (400-600 words), however, we also welcome multimedia/interactive and alternate forms of digital submissions (podcasts, video, etc.). This issue will go live in late March through mid-April. While the question is live, we publish daily content (Monday-Friday) from scholars who submit contributions through the site. The Field Guide is an open-access hub for scholarly conversations, a forum for touchstone issues in the digital humanities and media studies. This past year alone, our editions have included conversations surrounding medical humanities, the future of digital archives, religion and digitality, and public histories blending with critical play. Additionally, the MediaCommons’ mission involves fostering conversation between scholars at all levels of professionalization, with an aim to have a diversity of voices!

If you would like to contribute, please contact coordinating editor D’An Knowles Ball (tknowles@odu.edu) in order to be scheduled for a contribution date. For more information on the MediaCommons scholarly network and its history and goals, feel free to visit our website. For addition information or if you have questions, contact D’An Knowles Ball (tknowles@odu.edu), or Avi Santo (asanto@odu.edu).