The "PHILOSOPHY OF MEMES" student conference aims to bring together students and researchers in philosophy of mind, cognitive science, pragmatics and semiotics, in order to advance our understanding of the culture of memes and the cognitive mechanisms underlying memes sharing, production and interpretation.

The conference will take place 16-17 March 2024, between 9 AM- 9 PM, local time for Bucharest, Romania. Regular presentations will be 20 minutes long, followed by 10 minutes long Q&A.

It will have a mixed format, in that speakers may choose whether they present online only or face to face at the event's location (if so, their session will enjoy a live audience, but it will also be streamed to remote participants).

Keynote speakers:

Cristina Voinea (University of Oxford) -Social media platforms as digital slot machines.

Simon Evnine (University of Miami)

Topic areas:

History of memes
Memes and cognitive mechanisms and processes
Pragmatics and linguistic features of memes
Semotic views
Social and political features of memes

Call for abstracts

We encourageBA, MA and PhD students, as well as early PhD's and postdocs, to contribute research abstracts related to the event's topic areas. Abstracts should be written in English and should not exceed 300 words.

Abstracts will receive full consideration if sent before February 15th, 2024 at the following address: [email protected] Word or PDF attachments preferred, with the message titled "abstract submission".

All submissions will go through a process of blind peer review. (Please write your identifying details in the body of the email, and leave the attached abstract anonymized.) We intend notifications of acceptance to be sent out on or before February 20th, 2024. The conference programme will be announced as soon as review is completed.

For any questions, please don't hesitate to email [email protected]

You may register at the same address (or by RSVP here on PhilEvents) on or before March 14th in order to receive the Zoom connection details.

The conference is organized with the support of undergraduate students in the bachelor’s programme in cognitive science within the Department for Psychology at the University of Bucharest and with the support of graduate students in the doctoral school of theorethical philosophy within the Department for Theoretical Philosophy at the University of Bucharest.