Foto: Eivind Senneset
Chapter call, seminar and workshop
University of Bergen, Norway
Department of Information Science and Media Studies
Monday May 19h – Tuesday May 20, 2024
This is a call for chapter proposals and participation in a seminar and workshop for the project
Trustworthiness: The Rhetorical History of Trust in the Nordics
We hereby invite chapter proposals and seminar participation for the book and seminar The Rhetorical History of Trust in the Nordics. The book will be a result of the research network and project of the same name.
The project has previously had workshops examining the forging of modern Nordic nations from the 19th century (Aarhus, fall 2023) and examining the heyday of Nordic social democracy in the post-WWII era (Uppsala, spring 2024). This third workshop in Bergen (May 19-20, 2025), will devote special attention to the recent reconfiguration of the Nordic welfare state in the age of neoliberalism, the multipolar, and the multicultural. This workshop will also address trust as a rhetorical phenomenon.
Together, these workshops form a historical sequence which develops the overarching theme in the three “deep dives” into history. For the 2025 workshop we invite scholars of rhetoric, communication, and adjacent disciplines such as history and historical sociology to propose chapters for the book. Authors of proposals that are accepted will be invited to a seminar and workshop in Bergen, Norway, on May 19-20, 2025.
The first day of the seminar in Bergen will mainly consist of selected keynote talks by prominent researchers in trust and rhetoric. Among confirmed speakers are Ute Frevert from Max Planck Institute in Berlin, and Dag Wollebæk from Institute for Social research in Oslo. The day will begin with a talk by the editorial team on the subject of “Rhetorical Trust”. This day of the event is open and free to attend: Be aware that there is a maximum attendance of 35 people. The second day is limited to authors contributing to the book Trustworthiness: The Rhetorical History of Trust in the Nordics. Participants will be invited based on their chapter proposal. This day will mainly consist of work-in-progress workshops where we work in groups on the papers selected for publication in the book.
Based on the three workshops, the organizers will edit a book dealing with 1) the development of trust as a rhetorical concept, 2) rhetorical explorations and explanations of trustworthiness and trust in the Nordic countries. Thus, the outcome of the workshop series will be an edited volume, tentatively titled The Rhetorical History of Trust in the Nordics. The working language will be English.
Would you like to submit a chapter proposal?
Please send a chapter proposal of 500-1000 words and a 30-50 word bio to Jens E. Kjeldsen (jens.kjeldsen@uib.no) and write “Chapter Proposal for Trustworthiness” in the subject field. Deadline: February 20, 2025. If your proposal is accepted you will be expected to participate on both days of the seminar in Bergen on May 19-20, 2024.
Would you like to attend the first and open day of the seminar?
If you would like to participate in the open day of the seminar, then please send an e-mail announcing your registration to Jens E. Kjeldsen (jens.kjeldsen@uib.no). Write “Trustworthiness in Bergen” in the subject field. Deadline: May 1, 2025. Be aware that there is a maximum limit for participation of 35 people.
Background for the project, the seminars and the publication
The Nordics are consistently among the world’s most trusting countries, and this trust is routinely used to explain the stability, prosperity, and even happiness of the citizens in the Nordic countries. Today, however, a wide range of factors threaten to overturn Nordic people’s propensity to trust each other, including an increasingly fragmented media landscape, as well as a more conflictual political atmosphere. To sustain the Nordic region’s unique tendency for trustworthiness and trust into the future, we need a solid research-based understanding of how this tendency originally came about and developed, and how it has been maintained over time.
Existing research slants toward the social sciences and generally downplays the importance of communication to the creation and maintenance of trust. Thus, this series of workshops focuses on the historical exploration of the rhetorical creation and reproduction of trust in the Nordics.
Each workshop focuses on a separate historical period. The first workshop in Aarhus (fall 2023) examined the forging of modern Nordic nations from the 19th century. The second workshop in Uppsala (spring 2024) examined the heyday of Nordic social democracy in the post-WWII era. The third workshop in Bergen (fall 2024), will examine the recent reconfiguration of the Nordic welfare state in the age of neoliberalism, the multipolar, and the multicultural.
Together, these workshops form a historical sequence which develops the overarching theme in the three “deep dives” into history. We now invite scholars of rhetoric, communication, and adjacent disciplines such as history and historical sociology, to explore the central theme, using different countries, sites, texts, and artifacts as their starting point.
Workshop #3: Rhetorical trust through history. From the forging of nations to contesting and maintaining trust in an ideological, polarized, and multicultural age
The purpose of this workshop is to explore trust as a rhetorical phenomenon, and to examine and develop definitions, theories, and methods for studying rhetorical trust. What is trust in a rhetorical perspective? Can we talk about cultures of trust? What is a culture of trust? How may we theoretically account for rhetorical trust, and how may we methodologically explore it?
In extension of the two previous workshops, the seminar and workshop in Bergen also aims to explore articulations of trust in the Nordic Countries from the 1980s to the present. With political transformations from the late 1970s, and with globalization and public reform since the 1980s and 90s, the basis on which trust was originally built in the Nordics appeared to be challenged. Increasingly, citizens were treated as consumers, while workers were asked to comply with emerging regimes of audit and control. The issue of trust was ideologized, and a counteroffensive of “trust reform” has recently been mounted. Meanwhile, the population of the Nordic countries has grown more diverse than ever, and the challenge of nurturing trust in citizens who originate from other cultures persists. Despite these changes, however, high levels of trust have been maintained.
Thus, we seek to examine rhetorical trust in relation to the forging of modern Nordic nations from the 19th century; the heyday of Nordic social democracy in the post-WWII era; and the recent reconfiguration of the Nordic welfare state in the age of neoliberalism, the multipolar, and the multicultural. We aim to explore questions like:
* How was communal trust challenged rhetorically (in politics, media, the public, etc.) during these periods?
* In what ways has trust been rhetorically constituted, maintained, and reproduced despite cultural fragmentation and political “ideologization”?
* How has Nordic political culture and style been portrayed in opposition to international examples?
* How were Nordic citizens convinced to trust not only each other, but also the state?
* How has the notion of political trust been instrumental in shaping the self-presentation and self understanding of the Nordic countries?
* How has the notion of political trust been framed by various actors from different sides of the political stratum?
* What are the defining qualities of the present day rhetorical culture of trust?