This issue is part of a joint reflection on the value of information circulating in globalized societies and the literacy that would allow us to better understand these phenomena in order to orient ourselves. What do the current discourses of universities, and the media reveal about their roles in contemporary societies? The aim of this issue is to make visible and analyze the intentions and knowledge mobilized by professors and journalists, but also by managers and shareholders, as well as students and audiences, through their communications and actions in their respective environments.

In continuation of the symposium held on September 6 and 7, 2024 in Baia Mare, Romania, we are launching the 28th issue (autumn 2025) of the journal Sociocultural community development and practices which will be devoted to this subject: Ideological and advertising discourses in universities and the media

The purpose of this call is to encourage the participation of colleagues from different disciplines (literature, linguistics, communication, education, cultural studies, philosophy, psychology, political science, sociology, social work, etc.) and geographic regions, including Eastern Europe and Quebec, from where most conference participants came. This issue is part of a joint reflection on the value of information circulating in globalized societies and the literacy that would allow us to better understand these phenomena in order to orient ourselves.

Looking forward to reading your contributions and producing a substantial issue together.

Argument

What do the current discourses of universities, and the media reveal about their roles in contemporary societies? The aim of this issue is to make visible and analyze the intentions and knowledge mobilized by professors and journalists, but also by managers and shareholders, as well as students and audiences, through their communications and actions in their respective

environments. Do they contribute to the development of the autonomous and informed thinking and opinions of citizens, by democratically supporting their quest for situated knowledge, or do they relay a hegemonic perspective, which calls on a partial and biased way of thinking through persuasion techniques? From the point of view of social acceptability, what thresholds of legitimacy and relevance can this unidirectional reflecting reach when it organizes and disseminates information according to manifest ideological interests such as a promotional and advertising campaign? How do these discourses fit into regimes that are characterized by productivism, clientelism, authoritarianism, and the withering of academic freedom and opinion?

Many typical situations can exemplify the issues described above:

• Various scientific or citizen disagreements, including those related to the health measures taken during the COVID crisis12, are excluded from the public space13;
• The use of "censored" words14 or expressions (e.g., the "N" word), that resulted in the suspension or dismissal15 of the professors or journalist involved;
• The invisibilization of women16 and indigenous peoples17 in the adoption of an inclusive "neutral" vision;
• Hiring or appointments based on ideological, moralizing and non-scientific criteria18;
• A purge19 in libraries going so far as to burn20 books that do not correspond to the last politically correct values;
• Promoting a "false consent"21 in the form of ideas and values that seem unchallenged, clear, and supposedly accepted by all without real debate;

A self-assigned posture - of intellectual and moral representation - that places the subjects in a dynamic of rapports between the majority and minorities according to a polarization that stifles the expression of a greater diversity of points of view and interests at stake.

But what are ideological or advertising discourses? What meanings do they have for those who state them and also for those who are exposed to them? What interests do they serve and what do they promote? Are they ways to silence the opposition? Are they the manifestation of holds where indoctrination replaces true learning of reflective and critical thinking, nourished by the questioning and doubt (Motoi, 2023)? Is it not that, by dissimulating what we should not know, these discourses, determine in fact what we should know? What is the perimeter of the exercising of academic and journalistic freedom in this new economic and social order imposed silently by the verticality of decision-making processes without any explanation of which interests are taken into consideration and for which purposes? What happens to scientific or journalistic methods of research and investigation when ideologies state the "truths"?

Advertising discourse is not commercial advertising, even if it can borrow its procedures to promote its products. If commercial advertising contains a promise of happiness linked to a model of material comfort, advertising discourse contains a promise of integrity about certain publicly displayed values and beliefs. Its language resembles that deployed by advertising and promises also satisfaction, youth, prosperity, and the future on a silver platter. These promises create an illusion and, in this way, sell consumable "products", including programs and diplomas. Such products are then followed by the generalization of the desiring-buying-consuming-throwing away cycle and use emotions aiming to impress rather than to encourage reasoning (Robert, 2018; Motoi, 2021, p. 72-73). In this context, the plurality of viewpoints is absent and contradictory opinions are proscribed, while the results of surveys obscure certain data and the critical dimension is stripped away. In these speeches of persuasion and influence, the "party line," as defined by management, must be followed. As with any ideological discourse, two opposing conceptions are drawn upon (Voirol, 2008, p. 62-68):

• The "negative" connotation, elaborated by Marx and Engels in 1848 as a critical view of an abuse of influence inducing a distortion of reality that allows economic domination;
• The culturalist "positive" connotation, which Geertz used in 2000 in an uncritical sense as "symbolic integrator of a community preserving its cultural identity".

However, what happens to the point of view of individuals who need to understand in order to act? Are they recognized for their ability to think and judge, and for their freedom of expression and conscience? Are they endowed with "moral competences" (Boltanski and Chiapello, 2009)? Do we take what they say seriously? Can they disregard the influences of the groups to which they belong (Van Dijk, 2006, p.1), which provide them with schemas to interpret "reality"? As a result, certain individuals stick to the dominant ideology without seeing "their adherence in a negative way" (Voirol, 2008, p. 71). Then, when these ideological discourses are tentacular, is it possible to envisage a solution to emancipate oneself from them?

Klemperer and Solzhenitsyn risked their lives to denounce the Nazis and Soviets who killed millions of people in the name of ideologies that aimed to create by force the "perfect and just society" (Aubry and Turpin, 2012). They explained how in these territories the rupture between reality and illusion took place in a totalitarian way. More recently, Assange and Snowden have denounced the technocratic ideology that forcibly imposes a "free and democratic society". Is it the role of the university and the media to continue this work, or is it their role to continue "the conscious and intelligent manipulation of the habits and organized opinions of the masses, [which] is an important element in democratic society"? In 1928, Bernays, a pioneer of public relations, already asserted this as his thesis in order to legitimize mass manipulation. This allows a simple justification, under the mask of virtue, of the use of propaganda to continue to converge advertising and ideology and dominate minds. Bell's "end of ideology" (1960) mean that ideology would occur no more, or that there would only be one perspective forever, that which can be found in any authoritarian state?

Nevertheless, the promotion of ideology continued to be linked to propaganda and denounced. Moreover, Voirol (2008, p. 62) thinks that in Western societies, the absence of criteria for determining the "ideological disjunctions between actual social practices and the discursive and prescriptive registers imposed on them" has stripped any analysis of its "critical sting", which has favoured the rise of the advertising of ideas and all that follows from it. The underlying ideology promotes a certain combination of ideas and values that functions as a filter, reducing the examination of discourses to a single interpretive version, ridding them of their "impurities" by means of a distinction between « falsehood and illusion, on one hand, and […] truth and knowledge, on the other" (Ibid, p. 64). Therefore, as we are situated between individual autonomy and social control, it is important to understand how to "take possession of reality" and give an active character to our thinking and its cognitive-social impact on our human lives.

Here are some themes to explore further in this issue:

The resistance and searches for meaning that is present in this context of ideological advertising as related conformism in universities and the media:

• Tensions and forbidden debates;
• Interrelations among freedom of conscience, freedom of expression, academic freedom and freedom of the press;
• Rapports between the relative autonomy of journalists and the media and the level of media literacy (distinguishing opinions and facts, fact and fiction, fact-checking, preponderant models, discursive propaganda strategies, etc.);
• Impacts of technological automation, as the ones induced by generative artificial intelligence, on the industrialization of working conditions and how these are received.

The democratic deficit resulting from large-scale persuasion, the muzzling of discordant actors and the inability of citizens to exercise their right to quality information that is verified, which is transforming into a crisis of representations and references, and a non-recognition of the diversity of perspectives on the same phenomena:

• Strategies of seduction, disinformation, even manipulation, and the absence of contradictory perspectives, which together facilitate the fusion of emotions around a narrative core that is complacent towards the dominant powers;
• A single angle rather than the multiplicity of angles of view: there must be only one admissible narrative, often in the form of partial and divisive positions, without an overall perspective;
• Ad nauseam repetition of key messages to convince citizens, which creates the opposite effect, that of saturation, resistance and anger;
• Variations in the expression of this democratic deficit, as per different geopolitical regions and local conflicts.

The contemporary injunctions of ideological and advertising discourses as it pertains to human knowledge and self-defence against propaganda:

• Processes of standardization (protocolization) of thought, of the atomization and massification of individuals, of conditioning to technical dependence, of inclusion that excludes, of censorship that silences, of self-censorship and fear of the authorities, etc.;
• Transposition of the universalism of an ethics of human rights to the particularism of the discourse on "personal choices", particularly in terms of identity, and its impacts on people designated only as majority and minority;
• Framing of science in terms of political correctness, based on Newspeak and leading to the loss of critical authenticity and social acceptability;
• Confinement of critical thought to symbolic processes of political dynamics, without examining intersubjective thinking, cultural traditions and historical paths, disciplinary thinking, economic rapports and underlying ecological issues.

The journal

• Université du Québec à montréal (UQAM)
• https://edition.uqam.ca/atps
• Foundation: 2010
• Editor: Jean-Marie Lafortune 
• Dissimination on the platform: Érudit

Submission guidelines

We are therefore inviting proposals for articles between 1-2 pages written in French or English, with 4-5 keywords by February 15, 2025. The authors of the selected proposals will then have until May 15, 2025, to submit their text, which will be between 30,000 and 40,000 characters in size (excluding bibliography). These texts, written in French or English, must be accompanied by an abstract of a maximum of 1000 characters.

Please submit your abstracts and texts to: ina.motoi@uqat.ca

by February 15, 2025.

Calendar

• February 15, 2025: Deadline to submit your 1-2 page proposals, written in French or English, with 4-5 keywords
• March 15, 2025: Response of the Scientific Committee to the proposals received
• May 15, 2025: Submission of articles ranging in size from 30,000 to 40,000 characters (excluding bibliography), written in French or English and accompanied by an abstract of no more than 1000 characters and bibliography
• June 30, 2025: Feedback from double-blind peer reviews and possible suggestions for improving the texts
• October 1, 2025: Final deposit of corrected articles and linguistic revision
• November 1, 2025: The revised texts are sent to the webmaster for layout and editing
• December 2025: Publication of the issue

Evaluation criteria for the proposals

• Relevance to the general subject and identified theme, and the objectives of Issue 28;
• Meaningful contribution regarding the content;
• Making explicit the context of research, of the critical reflection or of the exposed practice;
• Coherence of the theoretical and methodological bases of the research or fieldwork.

Editorial board

The editorial board is composed of Ina Motoi (Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue), Ligia Tomoiaga and Anamaria Fălăuş (Université Technique Cluj-Napoca-Centre Nord Baia Mare), and Jean-Marie Lafortune (Université du Québec à Montréal).

References

• Aubry, L. et Turpin, B. (dir.). (2012). Victor Klemperer: repenser le langage totalitaire. Paris: CNRS Éditions.
• Bell, D. (1960). La fin de l’idéologie, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France. Bernays, E.L. (1928). Propaganda. New York: Horace Liveright.
• Boltanski, L. et Chiapello, E. (1999). Le nouvel esprit du capitalisme. Paris: Gallimard.
• Carniol, B. (1984). Clash of ideologies in social work education ». Revue canadienne de travail social, 2, 184-199.
• Daniel, M.-F. (2002). De l’importance de cultiver la pensée critique à l’université. Pour un savoir- faire, un savoir-être et un savoir-vivre ensemble. L’Autre Forum, 7 (1), 16-20.
• Geertz, C. (2000). Ideology as a Cultural System. The Interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basics Books.
• Gagnon, M. et Hasni, A. (2020). Pensées disciplinaires et pensée critique: enjeux de la spécificité et de la transversalité pour l’enseignement et la recherche, Montréal: Groupéditions.
• Lafortune, J.-M. (2019). La liberté universitaire comme forme spécifique d’autocontrainte. Dans Baillargeon, N. (dir.), Liberté surveillée, Montréal: Leméac.
• Farcaş, A.-D. (2024). Social values and propaganda: theoretical perspectives of key concepts.
• Revue ATPS, (25), 1-14. https://edition.uqam.ca/atps/article/view/2423/543
• Lucien, A. et Gaste, D. (2006). Le principe du contradictoire: paradigme de la société d’information? http://archivesic.ccsd.cnrs.fr/sic_000778235
• Marx, K. et Engels, F. (1992, c1848). The Communist Manifesto. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Motoi, I. (2023). Apprendre à penser de manière critique le visionnement des médias. Animation, territoire et pratiques socio-culturelles, 24. https://edition.uqam.ca/atps/article/view/2180
• Motoi. I. (2023). Enseigner à penser critiquement pour intervenir socialement. Sciences et actions sociales, Questionner les philosophies de l’intervention et de la formation sociales, 19.
• Motoi, I. en collaboration avec Beaulieu, A. et Gagnon, M. (2021). Guide de visionnement critique des médias, 1. Québec: Presses de l’Université du Québec.
• Robert, A.-C. (2018). La stratégie de l’émotion. Montréal: Lux.
• Rosa, H. (2014). Aliénation et accélération. Vers une théorie critique de la modernité tardive, Paris, La Découverte/Poche.
• Van Dijk, T. A. (2006). Discourse and manipulation. Discourse & Society, 17(3), 359–383.  https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926506060250
• Voirol, O. (2008). Idéologie: concept culturaliste et concept critique. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1 (43), 62-78.

Notes

12 https://www.revueargument.ca/article/2021-05-06/771-regard-critique-sur-la-crise-sanitaire-du-coronavirus.html and https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2022/03/10/stephan-bureau-brise-le-silence

13 https://libre-media.com/articles/luniversite-laval-menace-patrick-provost-de-congediement

14 https://ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/1741520/plainte-mot-en-n-universite-ottawa-suspension-professeure

15 https://agora.qc.ca/chroniques/francine-pelletier-et-le-devoir

16 https://www.ledevoir.com/opinion/idees/811623/idees-invisibilisation-femmes-plans-strategiques-ministeres and https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2024/10/26/sophie-durocher-publie-un-essai-sur-leffacement-des-femmes- dans-lespace-public-et-denonce-lobscurantisme

17 https://www.ledevoir.com/opinion/chroniques/792175/entre-nations

18 https://fqppu.org/la-ministre-de-lenseignement-superieur-pascale-dery-confirme-son-ingerence-politique-dans-le- refus-de-la-nomination-de-la-prof-denise-helly-au-ca-de-linrs/

19 https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2015/03/08/epurer-les-bibliotheques--des-livres-inappropries

20 https://ici.radio-canada.ca/nouvelle/1817537/livres-autochtones-bibliotheques-ecoles-tintin-asterix-ontario-canada

21 https://www.toupie.org/Biais/Effet_faux_consensus.htm