Section Head Election 2019 - Call for candidates and statements

Religion and Communication Working Group

The IAMCR Religion and Communication working group will run  elections for the election of the chair and vice-chair.

In the event of any IAMCR member wishing to serve as an officer of the Religion and Communication working group, he or she is requested to submit their name and institutional position, a statement of no more than 500 words (e.g. a bio and motivation statement), to the current officers (see contact details below) with a copy to Valeria Zamisch membership@iamcr.org and Gerard Goggin gerard.goggin@sydney.edu.au  by Friday 14 June 2019.

The vote will take place at the end of Slot 3, 17:15pm, on Monday July 8 2019.

Section officers must be current IAMCR members, either directly or through an IAMCR institutional member who has listed them among its IAMCR representatives, and they must be members of the Religion and Communication Working Group.

You can find the election rules at: https://iamcr.org/governance/swg-rules

You can find more information about the Religion and Communication Working Group at: https://iamcr.org/s-wg/working-group/REC

The current  chair, Professor Yoel Cohen is completing his period as Chair, and seeks nomination as Vice Chair.  As Vice-Chair Yoel will be happy to continue in his work in developing the annual conference program of the Religion & Communication working group but also seeks to extend the activities of the wg. Similarly, Professor Binod Agrawal , the co-chair, seeks election as the Chair.

During his period as chair, Yoel edited the book, Spiritual News: Reporting Religion Around the World - which evolved out of the IAMCR in Dublin 2013 --  and was published by Peter Lang Publishers. Binod Agrawal seeks election as Chair. 

Professor Agrawal draws upon wide academic experience, having served as vice-chancellor of Himgiri ZEE University, Dehradun, India; and as director of the Taleem Research Foundation, Bhopal, Ahmedabad.

Binod and Yoel  are veteran members of the IAMCR. Both Binod - of the Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India, and  Yoel - a Jerusalemite from The School of Communication, Ariel University Israel - are dedicated to advancing the international spirit of the working group - which brings together researchers from a wide range of research and religious traditions and countries. Both Binod and Yoel have collaborated together in the past on joint research projects.

Candidates and statements

For Chair:

  • Binod Agrawal (Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India)

For Vice-Chair:

  • Yoel Cohen (School of Communication, Ariel University, Israel)

Statements of candidates for Vice-Chair

Professor Yoel Cohen (School of Communication, Ariel University)

Professor Yoel Cohen of the School of Communication, Ariel University, Israel has been the chair of IAMCR's Religion and Media working group (previously the Media, Religion & Culture working group) for the past two years.

In addition to organising the IAMCR working group programme of the annual conference 2011-2019, has initiated and edited the book Spiritual News: Reporting Religion  around the world (Peter Lang Publishers 2018). 

Yoel Cohen is a graduate in International Relations from London University, and received his doctorate in Political Sociology from The City University. He possesses a Diploma in Jewish Studies from Jews College London. 

His  book publications include: God, Jews & the Media: Religion & Israel's media (Routledge Publishers 2012);  Media Diplomacy; the Foreign Office in the mass communications age (Frank Cass 1986); and Whistleblowers & the Bomb: Vanunu, Israel and Nuclear Secrecy (Pluto Press, 2005). 

His research has appeared in the Journal of Media & Religion; Gazette; The Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics ; Essachess: Journal for Communication Studies; The Journal of Arab & Muslim Media Research; Religion & Social Communication; Drustvena Istrazivanja; The Encyclopaedia of Religion, Communication & Media (Routledge) ; The Handbook of Media and Mass Communication Theory (John Wiley-Blackwell) ; International Encyclopaedia of Communication Theory and Philosophy (Wiley-Science) ; The Encyclopaedia of Media Effects (Wiley-Science) ; Media Editor of Encyclopaedia Judaica;  Mediating Faiths: Religion and Socio-Cultural Change in the Twenty-First Century (Ashgate) ; Digital Judaism (Routledge);  Religion & Popular Culture (Iowa State University Press) ; Negotiating Religious Visibility in Digital Media (Ramon Llull University); Digital Religion (Donner Institute Abo, Finland); Global, Perspectives on Media Events in Contemporary Society (IGI Global); Speech & Society in Turbulent Times (Cambridge University Press) , Religion & Reality TV: Faith in Late Capitalism (Routledge) ; Religion Online: How Digital Technology is Changing the Way We Worship and Pray (Praeger Press) etc