Editorial

As we ease into the 22nd year of the journal, we – the editorial board and its new co-editors – felt it was time to reflect on the journal’s history and its future. This is a long time for a journal – longer than many academic careers! – and so it feels useful to map where the discipline that the journal represents – media practice, including the teaching of it – has come from and arrived at. And, of course, where it might go next.

Media Practice and Education is the leading global forum for sharing creative media praxis. It is committed to encouraging the exploration of the interplay between critical and theoretical reflection, and the creative practice of media practitioners and media practice educators. This includes reflections on creative media research projects; positions on practice- and practitioner-related topics; and studies on pedagogies for the teaching of media practice, from undergraduate to doctoral level. The journal sees media practice as broad ranging and interdisciplinary, enabling it to make an impactful contribution to the advancement of practice-based knowledge.

The journal is committed to enhancing its inclusivity, leading and shaping strategies that enact diversity and decolonisation within media practice research. We actively work to further diversify our editorial board and editor roles, and we are delighted to progress this with the appointment of our new co-editors.

From Black Lives Matter to the ‘Me Too’ movement and beyond, the journal not only recognises and respects its diverse contributors and readers, it also actively seeks works that represent these issues, perspectives and demographics. This reflects the journal’s commitment to anti-racism, equality and inclusivity, and its aim to build methods for support to under-represented and under-resourced communities. This is a significant aim dedicated to helping shape the future of an increasingly important field.

Within the current research landscape, Media Practice and Education serves as an important platform and venue for research and voices that seek to decolonise, democratise and diversify concepts of academic publishing, and in the process influence academic research to foster greater globalisation and participation. It does this in two ways. First, Media Practice and Education fills a crucial gap by ensuring that voices from ‘practice’ get equal play in research arenas that often seem westernised and focused on normative values of media industries and influences. Second, the journal’s strengths are its naturally international approach to the study of media practice, its inclusion of traditionally marginalised groups such as those identifying as LGBTQI+, and its wonderful methodological diversity which highlights participatory action research.

The growth of academic discourse around media practice has come of age since the expansion of media degree courses at the start of the twenty-first century, and the journal sees its role to reflect this maturity in the work undertaken by those in the field. Both practical and theoretical approaches are welcomed, and in the case of the expansion of the creative doctorate too, creative-critical praxis. The explosion of media practice in the general population since the COVID-19 pandemic (virtual meetings, use of photography, video and social media), and with the increasing move to online education delivery is making further important changes to our forms of communication and our cultural fabric. We believe the journal is ideally placed to debate and reflect on these developments.

Our practices of making are also evolving in their own distinct ways and are increasingly used to undertake research and articulate research findings. Film, screenwriting, photography, AR/VR, journalism, sound arts and design, to name just a few, are all ways in which critical ideas and their embodiment suffuse each other through outstanding practice. Media Practice and Education stands on a firm ‘ground of practice’ – much better established now than when the Journal started, and we hope that over its 22 years, the journal has contributed to this shift. The wealth of practice-based doctorates awarded over the last two decades internationally, and the parameters of research evaluation exercises such as the Research Excellence Framework (REF) (UK), Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA) and Quality Evaluation (New Zealand) – frameworks that will be explored in our forthcoming annual symposium – are also influenced by the step change that comes with the maturation of practices that have been championed by this journal.

Using technology like social media platforms will be an integral part of our strategy. We are especially enthused to bring about special issues related to intersectionality of feminism, race and media, from both industry and pedagogy. None of this will be possible without deep collaborations with the journal’s editorial board, contributors and reviewers. So, a central aspect of our editorial vision will be to ensure more effective partnerships among these groups. In doing so, we commit to foster greater internationalisation of research considered and to encourage deeper engagement with the Global South.

Looking ahead, we are introducing new ways to respond more swiftly to contributors, ensuring that important work is reviewed quickly and published in a timely manner. We reiterate our commitment to featuring work from and about marginalised communities whose experiences so often show a path of progress. To this end, we invite submissions from all corners of the globe, authored by and with those from all communities and cultures.

Thank you for your continued interest in and support of Media Practice and Education, and the creative-critical contributions that you make.

We hope you will enjoy this issue of the journal, and we welcome your engagement to help shape many in the years to come.

Your Editors and Editorial Board