Karin Fast

I am an Associate Professor in Media and Communication Studies at the Department of Geography, Media and Communication, Karlstad University. I also work part-time at the Department of Media and Communication at the University of Oslo, Norway.

Current research interests

Today, my research spans four key research fields: mediatization, media work, transmedia and geomedia. My most recent projects and publications evolve around themes such as ‘transmedia work’, ‘coworking’, ‘disconnectivity’, ‘gentrification’, and ‘geomedia technologies’. I have published in peer-reviewed journals such as Communication Theory, Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, Media, Culture & Society, International Journal of Cultural Studies, Communication and the Public, Media and Communication and European Journal of Cultural Studies. Two of my latest books are:

• Fast, K. & Jansson, A. (2019). Transmedia Work: Privilege and Precariousness in Digital Modernity. London: Routledge.
• Fast, K., Jansson, A., Lindell, J., Ryan Bengtsson, L., & Tesfahuney, M. (2018). Geomedia Studies: Spaces and Mobilities in Mediatized Worlds. London: Routledge.

Some of my most recent research articles and book chapters are these:

• Fast, K. (2021). The disconnection turn: Three facets of disconnective work in post-digital capitalism. Convergence. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177%2F13548565211033382. Published online first.
• Lindell, J., Jansson, A., & Fast, K. (2021). I’m here! Conspicuous geomedia practices and the reproduction of social positions on social media. Information, Communication & Society, 1-20.
• Fast, K., Lindell, J. & Jansson, A. (2021). Disconnection as Distinction. In Jansson, A. & Adams, P. C. (Eds.) Disentangling: The Geographies of Digital Disconnection. Oxford University Press, pp. 61-90.
• Jansson, A., Bengtsson, S., Fast, K., & Lindell, J. (2020). Mediatization from within: A plea for emic approaches to media-related social change. Communication Theory.
• Bengtsson, S., Fast, K., Jansson, A., & Lindell, J. (2020). Media and basic desires: An approach to measuring the mediatization of daily human life. Communications, 1 (ahead-of-print).
• Fast, K; Ljungberg, E., & Braunerhielm, L. (2019). On the social construction of geomedia technologies. Communication and the Public 4(2), 89-99. 11 s.
• Fast, K. (2018). A discursive approach to mediatization: corporate technology discourse and the trope of media indispensability. Media and Communication, 6(2), 15-28. 14 s.

Recent conference papers of mine include, for example:

• Fast, K. & Enli, Gunn (2021). Digital distancing – As good as it gets?: A study of political work and life under the (dis)connectivity imperative. Nordmedia2021, August 18-20. Virtual conference.
• Lindell, J, Jansson, A, & Fast, K. (2021). I’m here! Conspicuous geomedia practices and the reproduction of social positions on social media. ICA: International Communication Association, May 27-31. Virtual conference.
• Fast, K. (2021). Where the spatial elite resides?: Examining coworking and coworking spaces through the lens of eliteness instead of precariousness. ICA: International Communication Association, May 27-31. Virtual conference.
• Fast, K. (2021). Enter the Post-Digital Housewife: Re-spatializing digital labour in the culture of disconnectivity. American Association of Geographies (AAG): Annual Meeting, April 7-11. Virtual conference. 
• Fast, K. (2021). The ‘disconnection turn’ and its consequences for work. Higher Seminar at Södertörn University, May 18. Stockholm/virtual seminar. Invited speaker (with Trine Syvertsen).
• Fast, K., Lindell, J. & Jansson, A. (2021). Disconnection as distinction: A Bourdieusian study of where people withdraw from digital media. Geomedia2021: Off the Grid, May 5-8. Virtual conference.
• Fast, K. (2021). (Dis)connected territories in the post-digital city. Designing the Local in Times of Geomedia (organized by The Geomedia Research Group at Karlstad University), April 15. Virtual conference.

Ongoing research projects

Much of my research is conducted within The Geomedia Research Group – a prioritized interdisciplinary research environment at the intersection of Media and Communication Studies, Film Studies, Tourism Studies, and Human Geography, at Karlstad University. I am part of the group’s management team and the coordinator of Geomedia's research infrastructure, which encompasses a longitudinal and qualitative interview panel on (experiences of and ideas about) geomediatization. 

I also conduct longitudinal (geo)mediatization research within the frames of the longitudinal survey project Meassuring Mediatization (funded by Anne-Marie och Gustaf Anders stiftelse för mediaforskning). 

Currently, I hold a position (20% of full-time) as Researcher at the Department of Media and Communication Studies at the University of Oslo, where I work in the project Invasive Media, Ambivalent Users and Digital Detox (Digitox), led by Professor Trine Syvertsen (University of Oslo) and funded by the Norwegian Research Council (2019-23). The project is a collaboration between the University of Oslo (media studies and psychology), University of Bergen (media studies) and Kristiania University (media/game studies). I will work full-time in the project until June 2021. Part of my job is to coordinate one of the project's four work packages: Norms and policies. 

Upcoming research project (starting August 2022)

In 2022, I will also start working in Hot Desks in Cool Places: Coworking as Post-Digital Industry and Movement; a 4-year research project funded by the Swedish Research Council and led by Professor André Jansson (Karlstad University). This project addresses the future of work, and battles over this future, by studying a trendsetting type of media-enhanced, urban workplaces: so-called coworking spaces. As the notion of 'post-digital' in the title suggests, particular attention in this project too is given to expressions of digital reflexivity and disconnection. For example, we are curious to learn how coworking spaces react to and potentially materialize (e.g. in office layout) digital disconnection sentiments and norms. 

Previous research projects

Before I started my position in Oslo, I was the project leader of Music Ecosystems Inner Scandinavia (MECO) – a three-year, bilingual, interdisciplinary and cross-sectional research project that, among other things, asks critical questions about the unequal conditions of music consumption in the era of accelerating digitalization and datafication. The still ongoing project is a collaboration between Karlstad University and Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences, and co-funded by EU/Interreg Sweden-Norway, Region Värmland, Studiefrämjandet Örebro-Värmland, Karlstad University, Arvika Kommun, and Hedmark Fylkeskommune.

• My previous research projects also include Music Innovation Networks Inner Scandinavia (MINS) (2015-18, funded by EU/Interreg)
• Kinetic Élites: The Mediatization of Social Belonging and Close Relationships among Mobile Class Fractions (2012-15, funded by Swedish Research Council).

I finished my PhD in 2012, with my thesis More Than Meets the Eye: Transmedial Entertainment as a Site of Pleasure, Resistance and Exploitation. The thesis builds on a full-circuit qualitative study of Hasbro’s Transformers brand, and scrutinizes producer-consumer power-relations in the age of media convergence through the lenses of political economy and cultural studies.

Recent research awards

’Top Faculty Paper Award of the ICA Philosophy, Theory and Critique Division’, 2019, for the paper Bengtsson, S., Fast, K., Jansson, A., & Lindell, J. (2019). Media and basic desires: An approach to measuring the mediatization of daily life. ICA 69th Annual Meeting, May 24-28, Washington D C., USA.

‘The Wolfgang Donsbach Outstanding Article of the Year Award’ of the ICA Journalism Studies Division, 2019, for the article Örnebring, H., Karlsson, M., Fast, K., & Lindell, J. (2018). The space of journalistic work: A theoretical model. Communication Theory, 28(4), 403-423.

I teach and supervise a variety of (geo)media studies courses across various educational levels, including the masters’ and doctoral studies'. I have also been the Programme director of Master Programme in Geomedia Studies: Media, Mobility and Spatial Planning – an interdisciplinary, international master’s programme that integrates Media and Communication Studies and Human Geography into what we call ‘Geomedia Studies’. The programme was launched in August 2019, and is open to qualified students from Media and Communication Studies, Human Geography, or adjacent subjects.

PhD Thesis

Fast, K. (2012). More Than Meets the Eye: Transmedial Entertainment as a Site of Pleasure, Resistance and Exploitation. Karlstad: Karlstad University Studies. 

Books

Fast, K., Jansson, A., Tesfahuney, M., Ryan-Bengtsson, L. & Lindell, J. (2018). Geomedia Studies: Spaces and Mobilities in Mediatized Worlds. New York: Routledge.  

Fast, K., & Jansson, A. (2019). Transmedia Work: Privilege and Precariousness in Digital Modernity. London: Routledge. 

Recent peer-reviewed articles

Fast, K; Ljungberg, E., & Braunerhielm, L. (2019). On the social construction of geomedia technologies. Communication and the Public 4(2), 89-99. 

Fast, K. (2018). A Discursive Approach to Mediatization: Corporate Technology Discourse and the Trope of Media Indispensability. Media and Communication, 6(2), 15-28. 

Örnebring, H., Karlsson, M., Fast, K., & Lindell, J. (2018). The space of journalistic work: A theoretical model. Communication Theory, 28(4), 403-423. 

Fast, K. & Örnebring, H. (2017). Transmedia World Building: ‘The Shadow’ (1931 - present) and ‘Transformers’ (1984 - present), International Journal of Cultural Studies, 20(6), 636–652. 

Fast, K., Örnebring, H, & Karlsson, M. (2016). Metaphors of free labor: A typology of unpaid work in the media sector, Media, Culture & Society, 38(7), 963-978. 

Fast, K. & Lindell, J. (2016). The elastic mobility of business elites: Negotiating the ‘home’ and ‘away’ continuum, European Journal of Cultural Studies, 19(5), 435–449. 

Karlsson, M., Bergström, A., Clerwall, C. and Fast, K. (2015). Participatory journalism – the (r)evolution that wasn’t: Content and user behavior in Sweden 2007-2013. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 20(3), 295–311. 

Recent book chapters

Fast, K., Jansson, A., Tesfahuney, M., Ryan Bengtsson, L., & Lindell, J. (2018). Introduction to Geomedia Studies. In K. Fast, A. Jansson, M. Tesfahuney, L. Ryan-Bengtsson, & J. Lindell (2018). Geomedia Studies: Spaces and Mobilities in Mediatized World. New York: Routledge, pp. 1-17. 

Jansson, A., Fast, K. (2018). Transmedia identities: From fan cultures to liquid lives. In M. Freeman & R. R. Gambarato (red.) The Routledge Companion to Transmedia Studies, pp. 40-49. 

Fast, K., Örnebring, H. & Karlsson, M. (2017). Metaphors of free labor: A typology of unpaid work in the media sector. In Yao Jianhua (Ed.) Digital Labour in the Media Industries (Series of Media and Digital Labour: Western Perspectives, Volume II). Beijing: The Commercial Press. (Re-print of article in Media Culture & Society). 

Recent conference papers

Bengtsson, S., Fast, K., Jansson, A., & Lindell, J. (2019). Media and basic desires: An approach to measuring the mediatization of daily life. ICA 69th Annual Meeting, May 24-28, Washington D C., USA. 

Fast, K. (2019). Revisiting the ‘home’ (again, and again, and again): Coworking, neoliberalism and the touristification of everything. Geomedia: Revisiting the Home, May 7-10, Karlstad, Sweden. 

Fast, K. (2018). The long durée of transmedia work. AAG Annual Meeting, April 10-14, New Orleans, USA. 

Fast, K. (2018). A discursive approach to mediatization; ICT companies, coworking spaces and the social construction of media indispensability. ECREA, 7th European Communication Conference. October 31-November 3, Lugano, Switzerland. 

Fast, K. (2017). Selling (the idea of) mediatization: Contemporary technology discourse and the indispensability of mobile media in work/life. NordMedia: Mediated Realities – Global Challenges. August 17-19, Tampere, Finland. 

Fast, K., Ryan Bengtsson, L., & Ferrer-Conill, R. (2017). Geographies of free labor: Conceptualizing and analyzing the ‘transmediascape’. NordMedia: Mediated Realities – Global Challenges. August 17-19, Tampere, Finland. 

Fast, K., Ryan Bengtsson, L., & Ferrer-Conill, R. (2017). A spatial approach to fan labor: Conceptualizing fan mobilization in transmedia marketing. Locating Imagination: Popular Culture, Tourism and Belonging. April 5-7, Rotterdam, Netherlands. 

Fast, K. (2016). Affective mobility: Mediated connectivity among 'elastically' mobile elites. American Association of Geographers: Annual Meeting, March 29 - April 2, San Francisco, USA.

Fast, K. & Lindell, J. (2015). On the reluctant cosmopolitanism of kinetic élites. European Sociological Conference, August 25-28, Prague, Czech Republic. 

Fast, K. & Jansson, A. (2015). The cultural forms of polymedia: A comparative study of connected presence among mobile elite groups. ACSIS: In the Flow: People, Media, Materialities, June 15-17, Norrköping, Sweden. 

Fast, K., Örnebring, H, & Karlsson, M. (2015). Metaphors of free labor: A typology of unpaid work in the media sector. ICA 65th Annual Meeting, May 21-25, San Juan, Puerto Rico. 

Fast, K. (2015). World-building vs. brand-building: Transformers as a marvel outcast and Hollywood star. ICA 65th Annual Meeting, 21-25 May, San Juan, Puerto Rico. 

Fast, K. (2015). ‘There is no place like work’: The mediatization of international labour. Geomedia: Spaces and Mobilities in Mediatized Worlds, May 5-8, Karlstad, Sweden. 

Fast, K. & Lindell, J. (2015). Elastic mobility: Negotiating the ’home’ and ’away’ continuum. Geomedia: Spaces and Mobilities in Mediatized Worlds, May 5-8, Karlstad, Sweden. 

Karlsson, M., Lindell, J., Ryan Bengtsson, L., Möller, C., Fast, K., & Jansson, A. (2015). Omnibus news: Engagement or bussed? Geomedia 2015: Spaces and Mobilities in Mediatized Worlds, May 5-8,  Karlstad, Sweden.

Örnebring, H., Karlsson, M. & Fast, K. (2014). The labor of journalism: Challenges of technological and economic restructuring. Digital Disruptions to Journalism and Mass Communication Theory, October 2-3, Brussels, Belgium. 

Fast, K. & Örnebring, H. (2014). Transmedia histories: Disjunctions and continuities. Conference proceeding, ICA Annual Meeting, May 22-26, Seattle, United States. 

Fast, K. (2014). ‘In the end they do what they want – so why even ask us?’: Perspectives on the production and consumption of transmedial entertainment’. Producers and Audience: International Conference, March 20, Lund, Sweden. 

Fast, K. (2013). Transformers and the ‘sector seven’ viral game: A case study of industry practices for raising active consumers and laboring fans. NordMedia 2013, August 8-11, Oslo, Norway. 

Other publications

Kaun, A., & Fast, K. (2014). Mediatization of Culture and Everyday Life. Södertörn: Mediestudier vid Södertörn; Karlstad: Karlstad University Press.