Te Pae Christchurch Convention Centre will host the International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR) in July 2024.
More than 1000 international and national delegates are expected to convene on the terms and models appropriate to describe contemporary communication, including the political and moral goals embedded in them.
Under the theme, Whiria te tangata | Weave the people together: Communicative projects of decolonising, engaging, and listening, the conference will offer delegates the opportunity to share views on Indigenous knowledge with the wider world.
Host University of Canterbury (with the support of ChristchurchNZ and Tourism New Zealand) is home to the country’s first journalism school and is the only institution in the country to offer a Māori communications major, making Christchurch the ideal location for the conference.
School of Language, Social and Political Sciences Professor Donald Matheson, the lead academic bringing this conference to Ōtautahi Christchurch, says: “Holding the conference in Aotearoa is a chance to put decolonising communication and Indigenous media at the heart of academic thinking. It’s also a chance for this country to share our experience of partnership between mana whenua and settler society.”