Assistant Professor (Docent)
Areas of interest:
(a) media anthropology
(b) media and religion
(c) visual culture
(d) media history
Current research projects:
Circulation – Theoretical and empirical implications for understanding media society research project (2011-2013). The rise of the internet and mobile media have challenged media and communication scholars as well as cultural and social theorists to develop new ways of theorizing communication more apt to grasp the mobile and cyclical nature of the web based media society (see e.g. Castells 2009; Urry 2008; Peters 2002; Appadurai 1997; Latour 2005). This project sets out to explore circulation. The empirical case focuses on the discourse on innovations and the innovation system as a contemporary belief system in three developed societies: the US, Japan and Finland. The project is part of the Fluid World Programme funded by the University of Tampere.
Past research projects:
Charlie Bit My Finger! What the News Media Can Learn from YouTube? research project (2010-2011) aims at offering new knowledge about the use of visual communication media and how YouTube establishes communality and a sense of belonging in today’s media-saturated society. The project is carried out by the Communication Research Centre at the Department of Communication, University of Helsinki. The project is funded by Helsingin Sanomat Foundation.
Crisis and Communication: A Comparative Study research project (2007-2009) was carried out by the Communication Research Centre at the Department of Communication, the University of Helsinki. The aim of the project was to analyse the social and cultural implications of different types of crises from Nokia town water crisis to the Jokela and Kauhajoki school shooting. The project was funded funded by Helsingin Sanomat Foundation.
Forthcoming publications:
Sumiala, Johanna (2012) Media and Ritual. London: Routledge. (forthcoming)
Recent publications:
Articles
Sumiala, Johanna & Tikka, Minttu (2011) Reality on Circulation – School Shootings, Ritualised Communication, and the Dark Side of the Sacred. ESSACHESS. Journal for Communication Studies, vol. 4(8).
Sumiala, Johanna & Tikka, Minttu (2011) Imagining Globalized Fears: School Shooting Videos and Circulation of Violence on YouTube. Social Anthropology vol. 19(3).
Sumiala, Johanna (2009) Networked Diasporas: Circulating Imaginaries of Violence. The Romanian Review of Journalism and Communication. IV(4).
Sumiala, Johanna (2009) Koulusurmat ja medioidut kuoleman rituaalit. Kulttuurintutkimus vol. 26(2-3).
Sumiala, Johanna & Tikka Minttu (2009) “Netti edellä” kuolemaan – koulusurmat kommunikatiivisena ilmiönä. Media & Viestintä vol. 32(2).
Pantti, Mervi & Sumiala, Johanna (2009) Till death do us join:
Media, mourning rituals and the sacred centre of the society. Media Culture and Society. Media, Culture & Society vol. 31(1).
Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna & Stocchetti, Matteo (2007) The Father of the Nation or Arch-Terrorist? Media Rituals and the Images of the Death of Yasser Arafat. Media, Culture & Society vol. 29(2).
Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna & Stocchetti, Matteo (2005) Mediated Sacralization and the Construction of Postmodern Communio Sanctorum – The Case of the Swedish Foreign Minister Anna Lindh. Material Religion : Journal of Objects, Art & Belief vol.1(2).
Book chapters
Sumiala, Johanna (2011) “You will die next”. Killer images and circulation of the moral hierarchy in Finnish crime news’ in Kari Anden-Papadopuolos and Mervi Pantti (eds.) Amateur Images and Global News. UK: Intellect.
Sumiala, Johanna & Hakala, Salli (2010) Crisis: Mediatization of Disaster in the Nordic Media Sphere. Teoksessa Broddason, þorbjörn; Kivikuru, Ullamaija; Tufte, Birgitte; Weibull, Lennart & Østbye, Helge (toim.) The Nordic Countries and the World. Percpectives from Research on Media and Communication. Göteborg: Nordicom.
Sumiala, Johanna (2008) ‘Circulation’ in David Morgan (ed.) Keywords in Religion, Media, and Culture. London: Routledge.
Sumiala, Johanna (2008) ‘Georges Bataille and the Dark Side of the Social; The Case of Abu Ghraib’ in Amanda Beech at al. (eds.) Episode The Pleasure and Persuasion of Lens Based Media. London: Artwords Press.
Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna & Stocchetti, Matteo (2007) ‘Rethinking the Visual Dimenstion of the Social’ in Matteo Stocchetti and Johanna Sumiala-Seppänen (eds.) Images and Communities. The Visual Construction of the Social. Helsinki. Gaudemus/Helsinki University Press.
Stocchetti, Matteo & Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna (2007) ‘Images and Communities: The Power/knowledge of Visual Discourse’ in Matteo Stocchetti and Johanna Sumiala-Seppänen (eds.) Images and Communities. The Visual Construction of the Social. Helsinki. Gaudemus/Helsinki University Press.
Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna (2006) ‘Implications of the Sacred in Media Studies’ in Johanna Sumiala-Seppänen, Knut Lundby & Raimo Salokangas, (eds.) (2006) Implications of the Sacred in (Post)Modern Media. Gothenburg: Nordicom.
Salokangas, Raimo & Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna (2006) ‘God, Crown and Mammon. The Public Sphere and Transforming Alliances and Balances of Power’ in Johanna Sumiala-Seppänen, Knut Lundby & Raimo Salokangas, (eds.) (2006) Implications of the Sacred in (Post)Modern Media. Gothenburg: Nordicom.
Articles in domestic scientific anthologies
Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna (2007) ‘Joku raja ja loppu on saatava tällaisille keskusteluille!’ Jatkoaika ja kansallisten kertomusten konflikti 60-luvun suomalaisessa televisiossa in Juhani Wiio (ed.) Television viisi vuosikymmentä. Suomalainen televisio ja sen ohjelmat 1950-luvulta digiaikaan. Helsinki : SKS.
Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna (2007) Tunnustan, olen siis olemassa – Myöhäismodernin mediakulttuurin terapeuttista eetosta etsimässä in Heikki Kujansuu & Laura Saarenmaa (eds.) Tunnustus ja todistus. Helsinki: Gaudemus.
Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna (2002) Terveisiä terapiasta! Katsaus suomalaisen televisioterapian olo(huone)muotoihin in Touko Perko, Raimo Salokangas & Heikki Luostarinen (eds.) Median varjossa. Jyväskylä: Mediainstituutti, University of Jyväskylä.
Scientific monographs
Sumiala, Johanna (2010) Median rituaalit. Johdatus media-antropologiaan. Tampere: Vastapaino.
Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna (2005) Kaksi Kotimaata – Kotimaa kristillis-yhteiskunnallisena sanomalehtenä ja mediatalona 1980-2005. Helsinki: Kirjapaja.
Sumiala-Seppänen, Johanna (2001) Nomadit Rippituolissa. Medioidun uskonnon moraalisen järjestyksen dynamikka (post)modernin television ja kulttuurin kontekstissa. (Nomads in the Confessional: The Dynamics of the Moral Order of Mediated Religion in the Context of (Post)modern Television and Culture.) Jyväskylä: University of Jyväskylä. (dissertation)
