CFP: Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies XXXIII 2021: "Social Media & the Self: The Promise of Connectedness"

JOURNAL OF INTERDISCIPLINARY STUDIES
CALL FOR PAPERS

    VOL. XXXIII  NO. 1/2  2021

    SOCIAL MEDIA & THE SELF:
    The Promise of Connectedness
    
    We live in an era of high-tech advances and social neuroses, anomie, and rootlessness.  Do social media contribute to the infantilization of the human race?  Internet connectivity appears to fill a primordial human desire for sociality, personal relationships, and social acceptance.  The quandary posed by social media is two-fold: On one hand, the immediacy of electronic connectivity mimics social acceptance.  On the other hand, the impersonality of electronic media fosters an artificial, phantasmagorical “alternative reality” conducive to acting out childish desires, day-dreaming, and puerile fantasies. Youth--the snapchat generation--are especially susceptible to the lure of social media.  The question arises: Can social media encourage healthy social relationships and foster personal growth and maturity rather than contribute to mental health issues and personality disorders? The thrall of utopia of instant communication and connectivity needs to be tethered to reality rather than a make-believe universe of primordial desires which may devolve into dystopia.  Psychologists like Abraham Maslow and Karl Gustav Jung may offer guideposts for redeeming the subconscious by opening vistas toward a transcendent grounding of Reality. One wonders whether Internet connectivity may be a substitute for religion?  While traditional religion offers to connect the believer with a transcendent deity, the Internet seems to bind one only to machines while promising intimacy. Key question, then, is: How to restore individual well-being and social felicity?
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JIS Mss. Deadline: March 15, 2021.  Send 1 electronic file (MS Word or RTF) via e-mail attachment: 15-25 page mss. (ca. 5,000-7,500 words), with ca. 150-175 word Abstract, typed, double-spaced, in-text citation format, author identification on a separate sheet to: [email protected]. C/o Dr. O. Gruenwald, JIS Editor, Institute for Interdisciplinary Research, 1065 Pine Bluff Drive, Pasadena, CA 91107, USA.  Early mss. submissions recommended.  Web site: https://www.jis3.org/callforpapers2021.