Programme and registration
TELLING THE TRUTH
Programme · 5–6 November 2026
Online
All times are GMT (UK) and use the 24-hour clock. Talks are 20 minutes plus 5 minutes for questions; lightning talks are 15 minutes. Where panels run in parallel they are labelled A, B and C.
You can download a pdf of the full programme at this link:
You can download the Book of Abstracts at this link:
To attend an event or panel, click on its Register here link: each session has its own registration page, so please register separately for every session you plan to join.
Day 1
Thursday 5 November 2026
08:30–08:50 Opening · Register here
Practicalities and conduct — Rachele De Felice
Introduction from the conference chair — Caroline Tagg
Welcome remarks from the Open University Pro-Vice Chancellor, Research & Innovation — Mark Brandon
Colloquia · parallel · 09:00–10:00
09:00–10:00 Colloquium: Truth, rhetoric and fiction A · Register here
Elizabeth Ford: Truth, rhetoric and fiction: literary forms of truth from the Elizabethan Stage, the late eighteenth century, through to the present day
With contributions by Tim Hammond, Elizabeth Ford, Richard Jones and Joanne Reardon
09:00–10:00 Colloquium: Democracy, disinformation and religion B · Register here
Paul-Francois Tremlett: Democracy, disinformation and religion: the mobilisation of truth by religious actors, institutions and counter-cultural communities
With contributions by Vickie Hudson, Joseph Powell and Precious Chatterje-Doody
Parallel panels · 10:00–11:30
10:00–11:30 Mediating Vulnerabilities A · Register here
Chair: Daria Chernysheva
10:00–10:30 Tamara Polajnar: Making Harm Legible: AI and the Truth-Telling of Victims
10:30–11:00 Lohita Raulo: Health Misinformation in the Digital Age among Vulnerable Communities in Odisha
11:00–11:30 Kyrie Miranda-Farnell: Avoiding the Algorithm: Self-Censorship and Euphemistic Violence on Social Media
10:00–11:30 Poetic Truths B · Register here
Chair: Alex Tickell
10:00–10:30 Elhadj Benmoussa: Whose Truth Travels? Translation, Memory, and the Politics of Authenticity in Contemporary Algerian Narratives
10:30–11:00 Dulani Kulasinghe: Locating Eddy: Reading against the grain of family stories and the colonial archive
11:00–11:30 Daniel Calvert: Ethnographic poetry and the (non-)representation of atmospheric truths in social science research findings
10:00–11:30 Public Truths C · Register here
Chair: Philip Seargeant
10:00–10:30 Britta Schneider: The Intersection of Truth-Construction and Language Materialisation Meaning-Making in Contexts of Print Literacy and Machine Learning and the Future of Public Truth
10:30–11:00 Frank Monaghan: Hillsborough: a telling ‘truth’, untelling the lie
11:00–11:30 Johannes Angermuller: Truth matters. For a socio-epistemic approach to public discourse
Plenary
11:30–12:30 Plenary Panel 1: Authorship · Register here
Andrew Bennett (University of Bristol) · Edmund King (The Open University) · Karina van Dalen-Oskam (University of Amsterdam and Huygens Institute)
Chaired by Francesca Benatti and Karina von Lindeiner-Stráský
12:30–13:00 Lunch
Parallel panels · 13:00–15:00
13:00–15:00 Truthful Characters A · Register here
Chair: Joanne Reardon
13:00–13:30 Anlie Williams: An Able Pen: Reading the Selves of Harriet Jacobs’s LINDA: Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself (1861)
13:30–14:00 Heather Fishwick: Retelling the Truth
14:00–14:30 Dora Rusciano: Fiction as an Instrument of Social Deconstruction and Critical Analysis in Daniela Dröscher’s Work
14:30–15:00 Radvilė Bartkutė: Infected by Kukutis: The Genesis of a Poetic Character
13:00–15:00 Trauma and Truths B · Register here
Chair: Kristina Hultgren
13:00–13:30 Clare Best and Patricia Debney: Capturing complex truths through collaborative writing
13:30–14:00 Amy Booth: Performing authenticity in a child sexual exploitation and abuse forum
14:00–14:30 Evangelia Mourtzanou: Victimhood as Process: A Critical Discourse and Systemic Functional Study of Trauma, Identity and Agency
Parallel panels · 15:00–16:45
15:00–16:45 Historical Storytelling A · Register here
Chair: Samuel Sargeant
15:00–15:30 Arunima Chakraborty: WhatsApp Histories: Digital Propaganda and the Crisis of Historical Truth
15:30–16:00 Katie Hazel: Telling the truth of the past: Emotional authenticity and historical storytelling in Call the Midwife
16:00–16:30 Lauren Alex O’Hagan: Constructing Truth, Selling Heroism: Commercial Narratives of Captain Scott’s Antarctic Expedition (1910-13)
15:00–16:45 Truths across Languages B · Register here
Chair: Rodrigo Hernaiz Gomez
15:00–15:30 Abdelhamid Ahmed and Lameya Rezk: Telling the truth across languages: University students’ use and metalinguistic understanding of evidentials in L1 Arabic and L2 English argumentative writing
15:30–16:00 Azzeddine Tamlakoutan: The Cognitive Grammar of Asymmetric Warfare: Force Dynamics and Spatial Proximization in Elite News Discourse
16:00–16:30 Paloma Simone Seger: Al parecer: Evidential Marking in Mexican Journalism and Expert Reports on the Ayotzinapa Case
16:30–16:45 Irina Zhilina: Why Russian truth cannot be pretty: “krasivy” vs “prekrasny” [Lightning talk]
Plenary
16:45–17:45 Plenary Panel 2: Authenticity · Register here
Maxine Ali (University of Reading) · Siobhan Campbell (The Open University) · Matti Kangaskoski (University of Jyväskylä) · Trask Roberts (Kent State University)
Chaired by Korina Giaxoglou and Daria Chernysheva
Evening event
18:30–20:00 Translation, Truth, and Textual Afterlives: An Evening of Transformation · Register here
Bianca Maria Alecu (University of Bucharest) · Matthew Reynolds (University of Oxford) · Helen Zaltzman (Broadcaster, writer, and producer of the linguistics podcast The Allusionist)
In conversation with Daria Chernysheva (The Open University)
Day 2
Friday 6 November 2026
Parallel panels · 08:00–09:30
08:00–09:30 Representing Truths A · Register here
Chair: Karina von Lindeiner-Stráský
08:00–08:30 JD Davids: Oral History, Artifacts and Collaborative Testimony: Whose Authority Narrates Queer/Trans Experience?
08:30–09:00 Carly Speed: The Hidden Truths of Deaths in Psychiatric Detention
09:00–09:30 Rod Hermeston: Disability Stylistics: From Stereotypes to Positive Potential
08:00–09:30 Influencing the Truth B · Register here
Chair: Olivia Kelly
08:00–08:30 Maxine Ali: Commoditized controversy in post-truth digital wellness economies
08:30–09:00 Nicola Wilson-Torch: Instagram, Inauthenticity and the Platformed Autobiography of Caroline Calloway
09:00–09:30 Melissa Avdeeff, Megan Rector, Viola Wiegand: Mediating Environmental Truths: UK Outdoor Influencers and Informal Sustainability Discourse on Instagram
Parallel panels · 09:30–11:30
09:30–11:30 Fictional Truths A · Register here
Chair: Francesca Benatti
09:30–09:45 Emily Bullock: The Truth of Ghost Stories [Lightning talk]
09:45–10:15 May Ouma: Author Authenticity, Censorship, and Conspiracies of Silence
10:15–10:45 Nicolas Mugavero: The Truth as Fiction
10:45–11:15 Louise Kari Mareau: Cynicism: a tool to sincerity?
09:30–11:30 Platforming Truths B · Register here
Chair: Korina Giaxoglou
09:30–10:00 Nikos Papadopoulos: Hypernarrativity and/as narrative capital: Performed authenticity and aura farming in postdigital platform ecologies
10:00–10:30 Abdelhamid Adarrab: The Architecture of Authenticity in Post-Truth Social Media Ecologies: A Discursive Analysis of Truth-Claims by Moroccan Content Creators Elmaliki, Essou, Raghib, and Swinga
10:30–11:00 Olivia Kelly: Truth in the age of social media algorithms
11:00–11:30 Rachele De Felice: Email as platform for truth in an emerging pandemic: the construction of Anthony Fauci’s authority
Parallel panels · 11:30–13:00
11:30–13:00 Discursive Truths A · Register here
Chair: Kristina Hultgren
11:30–12:00 Mohammad Aboomar: Shock or Appease: How Contradictory Truth Claims Shaped Evolution Popularisation in Arabic
12:00–12:30 Edmund King: Truth Telling in Hypernormalised Times
12:30–13:00 Nikolay Ternov and Dmitry Mikhailov: The lexemes “fascist” and “Nazi” in the Telegram discourse of military bloggers
11:30–13:00 Social Media Truths B · Register here
Chair: Frank Monaghan
11:30–12:00 Xiangyu Zhang: Constructing recognizable masculinities through identity play in parody videos by female content creators on Douyin
12:00–12:30 Kyu Hyun Park: Truth as Emotional Resource: Affective Truth-Claims and Community Negotiation in Korean Guilty Pleasure YouTube Discourse
12:30–13:00 Nicola Pelizzari: Pseudo-authority and Health (mis)information on TikTok. A corpus-assisted multimodal discourse analysis
13:00–13:30 Lunch
Plenary
13:30–14:30 Plenary Panel 3: Audiences · Register here
Dawn King (playwright and author of the acclaimed play The Trials) · Stuart Johnstone (crime fiction writer and former police officer) · Lara Frumkin (The Open University)
Chaired by Dónall Mac Cathmhaoill
Parallel panels · 14:30–16:00
14:30–16:00 Translating Truths A · Register here
Chair: Daria Chernysheva
14:30–15:00 Katharina Walter: Augmented, Not Automated: Authorship, Authenticity and Truthfulness in AI-Mediated Translation
15:00–15:30 Jesús De Prado Plumed: Hebrew Truth and Christian Polity from Anti-Jewish Spain: Emplotment, Mediation, and the Contingency of Truth-Claims in an Early Modern Case Study
15:30–16:00 Brinda Nair: When Chitra Becomes Painting: Translation, Authenticity, and Sacred Visual Discourse
14:30–16:00 Performing Truths B · Register here
Chair: Jonathan Gibson
14:30–15:00 Madeline Muravchik: Faking it, Honestly: Inherent and Staged Authenticity in Contemporary French Autobiographical Theater
15:00–15:30 Sabrina Francesconi: The female voice-over and truth-telling in audiovisual discourse
15:30–16:00 Charles Cathcart: Marston, Montaigne, and telling the truth
Parallel panels · 16:00–17:30
16:00–17:30 Unreliably Narrated Truths A · Register here
Chair: Francesca Benatti
16:00–16:30 Rebecca Connor-Evans and Alison Gibbons: Who remembers?: Cognitive Operations and Perspectival Mechanisms of Unreliability
16:30–17:00 Antonella De Blasio: Ambiguous Truths: Autofiction and the Poetics of Unreliability
17:00–17:30 Carmen Gomez-Galisteo: Truth Is a Story Someone Told Better: Unreliable Narrators in Gone Girl and Verity
16:00–17:30 Contesting and Correcting Truth Online B · Register here
Chair: Philip Seargeant
16:00–16:30 Ulisses Tadeu Vaz De Oliveira, Natalia Sexto: Defining Truth and Harm in Digital Platforms: A Sociosemiotic Analysis of Hate Speech Policies on Social Media
16:30–17:00 Harith Alani: Telling the Truth to the Unwilling: Audience Reactions to Automated Corrections in the Wild
17:00–17:30 Sadia Choudhri: Constructing Truth: Exploring Hypertext Framing in Counterfeit News of Fact-checking Websites
Closing
17:30–18:00 Closing · Register here
Practicalities — Rachele De Felice
Reflections on the conference and concluding remarks — Kristina Hultgren and Alex Tickell, The Open University
Farewell and next steps — Caroline Tagg
Banner image based on Bocca della Verità by Jorge Franganillo, CC BY 2.0, from Wikimedia Commons
