By Enock Sithole
All roads will lead to the Nelson Mandela University (NMU) in Gqeberha, South Africa, for the 2025 edition of the South African Communications Association (SACOMM) conference, which takes place from 8 to 11 September 2025.
SACOMM 2025 will be held under the theme Currents: People, Power, and Practice at the university named after South Africa’s anti-apartheid struggle icon and first democratically elected president, Nelson Mandela. The theme addresses pressing debates in media freedom, digital democracy, media sustainability, the political economy of communication and the effect of participatory media culture, reads the conference’s concept document.
Chairperson of the Local Organising Committee (LOC), Dr. Janelle Vermaak-Griessel (pictured), told Ajenda that NMU was excited about hosting the conference, which it last hosted more than 10 years ago when it was called the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University.
Dr Vermaak-Griessel told Ajenda that NMU’s Media and Communication Department, which is hosting the event on behalf of the university, boasts of being the “home to ocean science, research, teaching, and innovation.” Thus, “this conference adapts the theme to consider the shifting tides of media and communication in Southern Africa and the Global South, examining how power, people, and practices intersect in an era of poly-crisis, rapid transformation and rising authoritarianism,” said the Chairperson.
Having called for abstracts, the LOC has received over 200 submissions, excluding those from faculty members of SMU, from which to accept approximately 170, said Dr Vermaak-Griessel. “I would like all members of the Department of Media and Communication at NMU to present something at the conference just to show that we are not just the organisers, but that we are also able to add value to the conference,” she said.
The theme for the conference was inspired by NMU’s position as a leader in ocean science. Said Dr Vermaak-Griessel: “We have just got a newly developed marine studies campus and we thought, why not just link it all together in sort of the ocean, ocean sustainability and things like that… kind of raise awareness of the environment and bring that in as well?”
The conference concept text reads: “Just as ocean currents shape local weather and global climate, information and society co-influence each other, contributing to waves of social progress and innovation but also undercurrents that challenge social justice, democracy and development.”
The document decries several developments in the media sphere, saying: “Across the media landscape, we see the rise of anti-democratic pressures, the spread of disinformation, the surveillance economy, and algorithmic biases that amplify false content, deepen polarisation, and marginalise communities. These disruptions threaten media freedom, destabilise the public sphere, and erode trust in both media and society.”
At the same time, reads the document, society witnesses resistance, adaptation and new solutions, increasingly from new, alternative, or peripheral media role-players. “From decolonisation, digital activism and participatory media production to alternative media platforms, communities are reclaiming media spaces to address localized challenges and elements of our poly-crisis.”
The theme of the conference aims to get scholars to critically engage with media power structures, political communication, and policy reforms that can promote free, independent, sustainable, and pluralistic media ecosystems.
The submission of abstracts closed on May 31, 2025. Dr Vermaak-Griessel said they had received abstracts with some “very, very interesting topics” that will be covered at the conference. The LOC is now “trying to fit in everybody so that everybody has an opportunity to speak,” she said, adding that the university has enough space to have several panels running simultaneously.
Rhodes University will lead a panel discussion. The LOC finds it exciting to have a fellow Eastern Cape university play an important role at the event, according to Dr Vermaak-Griessel.
Students at the Media and Communication Department have also been roped into the various activities in preparation for the conference. They have been given an opportunity to create the conference’s corporate identity. “We are not outsourcing to anybody. We are doing everything in-house so that our students also get a lot of good experience and that can then add to their portfolios when they graduate,” argued Dr Vermaak-Griessel.
The number of participants is yet to be determined pending the finalisation of registration, which will be in August 2025. The LOC is also considering names for a keynote speaker and the option of whether to have one or more.
It will be five days of discussions, networking, and learning from each other, she promised.