With the Eurovision Song Contest scheduled to take place in Rotterdam in 2020, researchers Dr. Simone Driessen and Dr. Julian Schaap have taken the opportunity to organise an academic conference exploring music, identity, media, and politics in light of Eurovision. The conference, titled “EURovision 2020”, will take place on 6 & 7 May in Rotterdam. Details about the event will be announced soon - in the meantime, the conference is already receiving attention on several media platforms.
NPO radio show “Volgspot”
The call for papers that was recently shared has received media attention on the Dutch radio station NPO. In the “Volgspot” show, Dr. Simone Driessen explained how Eurovision is academically interesting, highlighting that the festival originated from the ambition to bring European countries closer together and how throughout the years the annual spectacle has developed further layers of meaning. Research interests can include audience engagement, fandom, identity (both in terms of participating countries and also the audience). It is also interesting in terms of politics, referring for example to how some countries have decided not to participate in the contest for political reasons.
ESC Xtra blog
The conference has also received some online attention in this blog post on ESCXtra.com, a blog which covers “all aspects of the Eurovision Song Contest.” With the conference taking place the week before the Eurovision Song Contest itself, the author describes EURovision 2020 as being widely expected to be the “rehearsal week”, not to mention unique for the fact that it’s the first academic conference about the contest held in the host city.
Organising committee
Dr. Simone Driessen and Dr. Julian Schaap from the Erasmus School of History, Culture and Communication (ESHCC) have teamed up with Nicolle Lamerichs (Hogeschool Utrecht) and Abby Waysdorf (Utrecht University) for the organisation of this conference. For more information please contact the organising committee at eurovision@eshcc.eur.nl.