University of Westminster scholar Pieter Verdegem’s edited book AI for Everyone? Critical Perspectives has been shortlisted in the Media, Communication and Cultural Studies Association’s annual Outstanding Achievement Awards in the Edited Collection of the Year category. Judges noted that the book is ‘an original and timely collection that, in analysing discourses surrounding AI challenges notions of technological determinism and highlights the enduring importance of concepts of power within mass communication’. 

The book, published by University of Westminster Press, as part of the Critical, Digital and Social Media Studies  book series, edited by Christian Fuchs, is an open access publication with an international line-up of scholars from a range of disciplinary backgrounds, setting out the need for critical perspectives on artificial intelligence in an era where AI is assumed to be inevitable and is seemingly ubiquitous.  Debate, the book argues, is urgently needed, especially regarding fundamental questions related to power.  Divided into three Parts, the book addresses critical perspectives on human-machine dualism, asks what makes for ‘desirable’ AI and what conditions makes this possible, and concludes by examining power and inequalities to explore how the implementation of AI creates important challenges that urgently need to be addressed. 

In short, the book offers a vital intervention on one of the most hyped concepts of our time. 

Available to download in digital versions here, here and here, it is also available to purchase in print here and at other online bookshops. 

The Awards will be announced during the MeCCSA annual conference held in Aberdeen from 7-9^th September. 

• Critical Digital and Social Media Studies series