Centre for Security Research

Content

29-30 June 2022 (over two half days, afternoon/morning)

University of Edinburgh

In-person, with a possible hybrid option

We invite contributions to our annual conference. Documents have long been a mainstay of social scientific research, but now new methods, approaches, and security documents offer fresh research opportunities. This workshop-style conference will showcase cutting-edge work in this area and set an agenda for future research. The conference invites papers reflecting on this broad theme from multiple perspectives and across a diverse range of topics. We welcome papers that reflect on methods for analysing security documents (their uses, challenges, etc.), and papers that employ methods for analysis of security documents and attendant practices.

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

• Practice-based approaches to how documents are produced and act within and beyond the security field.
• Technological approaches to security document analysis, such as natural language processing and automated text analysis.
• National security strategy documents and related publications such as defence white papers, national risk registers, and cyber security strategies.
• The role of leaked documents in security research and security politics.
• The role of document classification, declassification, and archives in security research and security politics.
• Reflections on the role and function of security documents drawing on theories of communication, discourse, actor-networks, symbolic power, symbolic interactionism, and so on.

If interested in contributing, please send a (working) title, abstract (up to 200 words), and short bio to ceser@ed.ac.uk by 13 May 2022. We will notify acceptance the following week. We may be available to offer a limited contribution to travel expenses, depending on need and demand.