ISMRC Conferences
Boston, August 2025
The 14th biennial conference on Media, Religion and Culture will be held at Boston College in Boston, USA from August 6-8, 2025.
More details about the 2025 Boston Conference.
Bochum, Germany, 2023
The 13th biennial conference on Media, Religion and Culture was held August 2-5, 2023 at the Center for Religious Studies at Ruhr University in Bochum, Germany. During the conference, two Stewart M. Hoover Mentorship Awards were given to Professor Birgit Meyer, Utrecht University and Professor Stig Hjarvard, University of Copenhagen.
Boulder, USA, 2018
The Center for Media, Religion and Culture and the College of Media, Communication and Information at the University of Colorado Boulder hosted the 11th biennial conference, August 8-11, 2018. The conference explored the relationship between media, religion and public scholarship. Keynote and Plenary Speakers included Anthea Butler, University of Pennsylvania, USA. Merlyna Lim Carleton University, Canada. John Durham Peters, Yale University, USA.
Past conferences
Online Conference, 2021
The 12th biennial conference on Media, Religion and Culture was held online on August 4, 2021. The virtual event, “Rethinking Religion, Media & Secularities” featured panels of select papers and a keynote talk by Professor of Communication Marwan Kraidy, Northwestern University in Qatar.
Seoul, South Korea, 2016
The 10th conference was hosted at Hanyang University and Hotel Samjung, Seoul, South Korea, from August 1-4, 2016. Keynote speakers included Professor Chin-Hong Chung, Seoul National University, South Korea, and Pradip Thomas, University of Queensland, Australia. Professor Lynn Schofield Clark, University of Denver, USA, gave the presidential address. The conference also included a performance of Korean music and dance, as well as field trips to religious and cultural sites surrounding Seoul.
The Ninth International Conference on Media, Religion and Culture
University of Kent, Canterbury, United Kingdom, from August 4-7, 2014, hosted by professor Gordon Lynch. Keynote speakers included Professor Jonathan Walton (Harvard), Professor Kathryn Lofton (Yale), author of Oprah: the Gospel of an Icon, with an address also given by the inaugural President of the society, Professor Stewart Hoover (Colorado).
The Eighth International Conference on Media, Religion and Culture
Anadolou University, Eskisehir, Turkey, July 8-12, 2012. The conference was directed by Dr. Nezih Orhon and featured a post-conference historic and religious sites tour.
The Seventh International Conference on Media, Religion and Culture
Ryerson University, Toronto, Canada, August 9-13, 2010. The conference was directed by Dr. Joyce Smith, and brought together an international cohort of scholars and producers and featured a series of compelling plenaries.
The Sixth International Conference on Media, Religion and Culture
Methodist University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil, August 11-14, 2008. The conference was directed by Dr. Magali de Naciemento Cunha and brought together scholars, producers, and activists from over twenty countries.
The Fifth International Conference on Media, Religion and Culture
The Sigtuna Foundation, Stockholm/Sigtuna/Uppsala, Sweden, July 6-9, 2006. The conference was hosted by the Sigtuna Foundation and directed by Director and associate professor Alf Linderman and Mia Lövheim. Attending were over 150 scholars and experts on religion and religious change.
The Fourth International Conference on Media, Religion and Culture
Louisville, Kentucky, September 1-4, 2004. It was directed by Dr. John Ferré and co-sponsored by the University of Louisville, the International Study Commission on Media, Religion, and Culture, and the Louisville Institute.
Between the 3rd and 4th CMRC meetings, the University of Jyväskyla, Finland held an important parallel conference titled Sacred Media (July 10-12, 2003), that fit into the goals and continuity of CMRC efforts. Directed by Dr. Johanna Sumiala-Seppänen, this meeting expanded the network of scholars of media and religion through a focus on technology and journalism.
The Third International Conference on Media, Religion and Culture
Edinburgh, Scotland, July, 1999. The conference was directed by Jolyon Mitchell and Heidi Campbell at the University of Edinburgh.
The Second International Conference on Media, Religion and Culture
University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado, 1996. This conference was directed by professor Stewart Hoover and Lynn Schofield Clark, and was the first major effort of what subsequently became the Center for Media, Religion, and Culture. It was attended by over 200 scholars and interested individuals from throughout the world.
The First International Conference on Media, Religion, and Culture
Uppsala, Sweden, 1994, directed by Alf Linderman, University of Uppsala.
Other international meetings have also been associated with the CMRC series. Among the most prominent was the Tehran International Conference on Religion and Media, held November 8-10, 2005 and co-sponsored by Tehran University and the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting University. It was co-directed by Prof. Sayyed Hosseini, Dr. Abosallam Javadi Yeganeh, and Dr. Hamid Abdollahyan.