On the occasion of the 72nd International Congress of the ICA (International Communication Association) and following an initiative of the French Society for Information and Communication Sciences (SFSIC), the GER “Communication, Environment, Science and Society” (CESS) and the Institut méditerranéen des Sciences de l’information et de la communication (IMSIC) organized in Aix-en-Provence on May 25, 2022 a pre-conference on the theme of the presence of non-human living organisms and plants in particular in communication (“Beyond the world of humans: Emerging plant communication in the public space”)
The event was endorsed by ICA’s Environmental Communication Division, as well as the (SFSIC).
The conference was opened by Céline Pascual Espuny (vice-director of the IMSIC laboratory and co-facilitator of the GER CESS), Andrea Catellani (co-facilitator of the GER CESS) and Nicolas Roche (DA of the ECCOREV Research Federation and Chargé de Mission Interdisciplinarité(s) d’AMU on the SDGs, Aix-Marseille University). The plenary lecture was given by Dusan Kazic (University of Grenoble-Alpes), with the title “How to imagine possible futures with plants?”
The day allowed 46 speakers, coming from the United States, Israel and Europe (Sweden, Spain, Italy, Belgium, France, see the complete program here), divided into different sections (English and French) to present their research. A bilingual round table, moderated by Céline Pascual Espuny and Andrea Catellani (“From environmental communication to plants: Environmental communication in the world”) saw Bruno Takahashi (Michigan State University), Fatima Viteri (IMSIC), Thierry Libaert (Economic, Social and Environmental Council, CESE) and Daniel Raichvarg (University of Burgundy) alternating on the themes of the development of practice and academic research on environmental communication in different parts of the world.
In the pleasant setting of the “Cube”, an emblematic building of the University of Aix-Marseille, an audience of about 60 people, both face-to-face and remote, appreciated the quality of the presentations and participated in the debate. The day ended in an artistic way with the screening of the film “Le chêne” (The oak), in the presence of the producer and director Michel Seydoux who spoke with the audience at the end of the screening.
A publication project is in progress, following the pre-conference. The pre-conference was made possible thanks to the contributions of IMSIC and the University of Aix-Marseille.
