Credits
Written by
Published
Source(s)
News
© esctoday.com
University of Thessaly
Greece: Pan European conference on Eurovision
The conference, entlitled "Singing Europe: Spectacle and Politics in the Eurovision Song Contest" takes place at the University of Thessaly in Volos, Greece between 29th February and 2nd March 2008. The contest is looked at from the musical, anthropological, sociological, political, sexual, linguistical, technical and economical points of view.
Issues such as the use of the contest by various countries for political reasons, the economy of the event, the politics of language, the rise and fall of Ireland in the contest, 'Swedishness' versus 'Europeaness' in the Melodifestivalen, the 2007 debut of the Czech Republic and whether Eurovision is "kitch or camp" will be discussed during the conference among others.
The key note speakers are: Marc Abélès (École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales) , Philip V. Bohlman (The University of Chicago) , Martin Stokes (Oxford, St. John's College). The impressive list of participating speakers spans geographicly from Greece to Serbia, the USA, the UK, the Czech Republic, Croatia, Ireland, Cyprus, Sweden, Germany and Denmark.
Some of the presentations include:
-Dean Vuletic (Department of History, Columbia University, U.S.A.)
A show of non-alignment: Yugoslavia's international relations and the Eurovision Song Contest
-Tony Langlois (Department of Music, University College Cork, Ireland)
The singing tiger: the rise and fall of Eurovision Ireland
- Milija Gluhovic (School of Theatre, Performance and Cultural Policy Studies, University of Warwick, U.K.)
The ethnic drag from the East: performing race, nation, and sexuality in the Eurovision Song Contest
- Ioannis Polychronakis (Department of Musicology, St Hugh's College, University of Oxford, U.K.)
Greece in Eurovision: 'a song for Europe'?
- Vaclav Stetka (Department of Media Studies and Journalism, Masaryk University, the Czech Republic)
Unintended effects of a media event: Czech Republic in its first Eurovision Song Contest
More information as well as the full programme can be found here
Related polls
- Hungary decided: do you like Szívverés
- Hungarian selection concluded: did you like the national final?
- Greek national final: your favourite?
Go directly to the reactions
Reactions
When reacting to a news item, please stick to the topic. Inappropriate messages (swearing, racism, hate, etc.), messages in other languages than English and spam (which includes URL advertising) will be deleted and you risk your account being removed. Reacting on newsitems is only possible when logged in as a member. Still don't have member account?
Click here to react Click here to become a member (free!)
@ Panos S
Do you really think that ''Mathema Solfege'',or ''Stop'' or ''Socrates esi Superstar''or ''Anixi''or even ''Pia Prosefhi'' are bad entries????
On the contrary...i believe that -at least- the above mentioned ones are one of the BEST Greek entries & some of them could have managed to conquer higher positions....if ERT had the same vision & passion as today 
CHEERS
@ vote united kingdom please . . . . thankyou very much
no, you didn't cause any confusion and yeah, I agree with you, the old Greek entries were bad but now we are great 
this great well done to greek university
I said Greece WERE rubbish. Now all of the Greek songs are FANTASTIC and Greece sends some of my favourite entries!!!
SORRY IF I CAUSED ANY CONFUSION!!!
congratulations to ms C. Baker on her discussion of Croatia at ESC. Well done girl
old 36 ..what would you call Modonna and jennifer lopez then..
Ireland's fall is of course a direct result of the rise. No Irish artist with any ambition wanted follow to be the next Niamh Kavanagh (or Linda Martin, EQ, PH or CMcG!) so by the end of the 1990s Ireland was reduced to sending Mullans and mullets, then the talent show kids and the dreary Dervish. No established Irish artist will touch the ESC now - unless of course it's the kind of artist for whom simply appearing on the eurovision stage would give a huge boost to his career and, in doing so, add to the gaiety of the nation! G'wan you good thing!!!!!!!
ahhh dont say that bout depina lol- shes fantastic!!!! well yes fresh is good but not when fresh is tuneless lol... i agree i hate carola, sweden should put robyn in- i luv her!!!!
very intresting.AND COME ONE GUY 
DESPOINA BANDI SHE AN OLD COW supose that eurovision has to done with young and fresh people (i love Anna Bissi but she was an old cow aswell for the eurovision)and i hope swedes people dont vote for carola is on of the same lol!!!!When i sayed old cow always i mean it for eurovision ok!!!!! dont people be angree with me.
HAHA how interesting! oh vote for uk... watevs ur name is ex-yugo nations only vote for each because of a similar music tradition and they know the singers performing e.g hari mata hari, karolina, tose, zeljko joksimovic- these are all big stars in ex-yugoslavia. if it was a case of simple neighbourly voting why hasnt slovenia recieved any decent votes???
greece u r not crap- but u havnt been that good- considering how much i luv anna vissi "everything" was horrible, argh u r the most annoyin nation lol coz i luv ur music but not always what u put in eurovision, come on guys despina vandi would win for sure
ESC is an interesting topic, but it's a party on the first place so I don't think that deserves an academic study.
About the subject "Yugoslavia's international relations and the Eurovision Song Contest", I can say that people constantly refuse to get the point- it's all about televoting and two basical reasons: one nation living in the other ex Yu country (e.g. Serbs livin' in Bosnia) and popularity of one country's performer in the other one (e.g. Severina's popularity in Bosnia, Slovenia,...).
Sonja,
That would be a logical addition to the analysys indeed, the profiles of the Esc fans and common denominators 
@ the Greek friends
I don't think "Vote for the uk" means Greece is rubbish. He means (if i get this right) that Greece made an effort and managed to win in 2005.
On topic now, kudos to the University of Thessaly for the initiative. But I have to say there is a point they missed, and that is the devout fan base of the contest.
Panos S.
Obviously we are not rubbish, we are the only country who has been top-10 every year since 2004 (including a win, and a 3rd place
vote for united kingdom
That was hilarious thanks How about writing a theme subject for the Uk too?
@ vote united kingdom please . . . . thankyou very much
No, we are not rubbish
sound intersting, would love be there ...
bravo for Greece
Maybe anyone could talk about some of these issues, i've had a go!!!:
1 - A show of non-alignment: Yugoslavia's international relations and the Eurovision Song Contest
Basically the FR Yugoslavian countries aren't too fond of each other outside of Eurovision, but suddenly become very fond of each other for just one night in May.
2 - The singing tiger: the rise and fall of Eurovision Ireland
Blame the fall of Ireland for the lack of juries.
3 - The ethnic drag from the East: performing race, nation, and sexuality in the Eurovision Song Contest
Everybody outside of Eurovision assumes its only for homosexual people becuase of the sheer & brilliant campness of it all!!!!!!!
4 - Greece in Eurovision: 'a song for Europe'?
Greece were rubbish. Now they aren't and win in 2005!!! durrrr
5 - Unintended effects of a media event: Czech Republic in its first Eurovision Song Contest
The Czechs enter a naff song (sorry if anybody is czech) and only get 1 point, what more is there to it??!!!!!
If you got to this part, thanks for reading all of the post!!!!
Interesting, a Greek University studying Eurovsion from the sociological-psychological-political-scientific-cultural-linguistic researches and thesis, hmm, so we are actually fans of a very important event
sounds interesting
It sounds cool!!
Bravo GREECE 
V. interesting & constructive initiative from my FAVOURITE Eurovision country
GO GREECE!
It would be great if Eurovision.tv could stream this. I'm assuming it will all be in English?
Well, that's interesting <img alt=":)" src="/images/s