Category: Critical Theory

Migration, mobility and aircraft, sea serpents, deep time, Covid, poetry and Notre Dame de Paris ‘entangled’ – Anthropocenes Journal 2021 contents
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Migration, mobility and aircraft, sea serpents, deep time, Covid, poetry and Notre Dame de Paris ‘entangled’ – Anthropocenes Journal 2021 contents

Seven new research articles/contributions have been published in UWP’s journal Anthropocenes – Human, Inhuman, Posthuman. Journal authors continue to rethink in the words of the editors (about the journal) ‘abstraction, art, architecture, design, governance, ecology, law, politics and discourses of science in the context of human, inhuman and posthuman frameworks’. And this is showcased in an eclectic and uniquely interdisciplinary mix of material published in Vol 2 issue 1 which covers January 2021 to the end of July so far.

See here for the new issue contents for this year and here for 2020.

Readers have enthusiastically responded to the journal’s mix of material that mirrors and interprets the Anthropocene; that have reflected on the significance of eels, ‘sea serpents’, polar bears, invasive insects and human bodies; considered urban, mixed-use, dune, river and post-industrial landscapes; presented material as poetry, audio essays, visual essays, book reviews and creative writing on science. And of course reflected broadly on the key issues of climate change disasters, deep time, culture and the uses of architecture, data aesthetics, frontier technology, hyperobjects, Covid-19 and how to move beyond anthropocentricism.

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AI for Everyone? Critical Perspectives

UWP is pleased to announce that it will soon be publishing a new book exploring the role of contemporary AI and issues that need to be addressed concerning it. The volume will be edited by Pieter Verdegem of the University of Westminster. And it will be published open access in the series, Critical Digital and Social Media Studies edited by Christian Fuchs.

Description
We are entering a new era of technological determinism and solutionism in which governments and business actors are seeking data-driven change, assuming that AI is now inevitable and ubiquitous. But we have not even started asking the right questions, let alone developed an understanding of the consequences. Urgently needed is debate that asks and answers fundamental questions about power. This book brings together critical interrogations of what constitutes AI, its impact and its inequalities in order to offer an analysis of what it means for AI to deliver benefits for everyone.

The book is structured in three parts: Part 1, AI: Humans vs. Machines, presents critical perspectives on human-machine dualism. Part 2, Discourses and Myths about AI, excavates metaphors and policies to ask normative questions about what is ‘desirable’ AI and what conditions make this possible. Part 3, AI Power and Inequalities, discusses how the implementation of AI creates important challenges that urgently need to be addressed.

Bringing together scholars from diverse disciplinary backgrounds and regional contexts, this book offers a vital intervention on one of the most hyped concepts of our times.

Contents

  1. 1. Introduction: Why We Need Critical Perspectives on AI
    Pieter Verdegem

Part 1: AI – Humans vs. Machines

2.Artificial Intelligence (AI): When Humans and Machines Might Have to Coexist 
Andreas Kaplan

3. Digital Humanism: Epistemological, Ontological and Praxiological Foundations 
Wolfgang Hofkirchner

4. An Alternative Rationalization of Creative AI by De-Familiarizing Creativity: Towards an Intelligibility of Its Own Terms 
Jenna Ng

5. Post-Humanism, Mutual Aid
Dan McQuillan

Part 2: Discourses and Myths About AI

6. The Language Labyrinth: Constructive Critique on the Terminology Used in the AI Discourse
Rainer Rehak

7. AI Ethics Needs Good Data
Angela Daly, S. Kate Devitt and Monique Mann

8. The Social Reconfiguration of Artificial Intelligence: Utility and Feasibility
James Steinhoff 

9. Creating the Technological Saviour: Discourses on AI in Europe and the Legitimation of Super Capitalism
Benedetta Brevini

10. AI Bugs and Failures: How and Why to Render AI-Algorithms More Human?  Alkim Almila Akdag Salah

Part 3: AI Power and Inequalities 

11. Primed Prediction: A Critical Examination of the Consequences of Exclusion of the Ontological Now in AI Protocol
Carrie O’Connell and Chad Van De Wiele

12. Algorithmic Logic in Digital Capitalism
Jernej A. Prodnik

13. Not Ready for Prime Time: Biometrics and Biopolitics in the (Un)Making of California’s Facial Recognition Ban
Asvatha Babu and Saif Shahin

14. Beyond Mechanical Turk: The Work of Brazilians on Global AI Platforms  Rafael Grohmann and Willian Fernandes Araújo

15. Towards Data Justice Unionism? A Labour Perspective on AI Governance  Lina Dencik

The Authors

Index 

(Paperback): 978-1-914386-16-9 (PDF): 978-1-914386-13-8 (EPUB): 978-1-914386-14-5

ISBN (Kindle): 978-914386-15-2

DOI: 10.16997/book55

Anthropocene Islands published to acclaim

Anthropocene Islands published to acclaim

A new book exploring the significance of Island Studies for the Anthropocene was published yesterday to advance acclaim, as described in a recent blog posting. As with all University of Westminster Press titles it is available open access.

Anthropocenes Islands: Entangled Worlds was written by Jonathan Pugh and David Chandler.

Acclaim for Anthropocene Islands

‘A must read … In this long-awaited book, [Pugh and Chandler] open up a new analytical agenda for the Anthropocene, coherently drawing out the power of thinking with islands.’ – Elena Burgos Martinez, Leiden University

‘This is an essential book. By thinking with islands, Pugh and Chandler articulate new ontologies and epistemologies to help us understand the relational entanglements of the Anthropocene. The four analytics they propose—Resilience, Patchworks, Correlation, and Storiation—offer both a critical agenda for island studies and compass points through which to navigate the haunting past, troubling present, and precarious future.’ – Craig Santos Perez, University of Hawai’i, Manoa

‘All academic books should be like this: hard to put down. Informative, careful, sometimes devasting, yet absolutely necessary – if you read one book about the Anthropocene let it be this. You will never think of islands in the same way again.’ –  Kimberley Peters, University of Oldenburg

‘Makes the compelling case that islands have never been merely geocultural objects of study, but rather, generative conceptual “objects” [for understanding and engaging] the wider, planetary, relational matrix within which the conditions of the Anthropocene era were created.’ – Michelle Stephens, Rutgers University

‘What if we were to start not with the great drama of the world’s falling apart, but with a myriad of smaller stories of its coming together? … a unique journey into the Anthropocene. Critical, generous and compelling’.  – Nigel Clark, Lancaster University

‘Replete with “aha!” and “huh!” moments, this book offers insights for all of us … who may not have recognised … the value of “thinking with” islands more purposively.’ – Lauren Rickards, RMIT University

‘ … a must-read … elucidates novel understandings of islands not only as patches of intensified Anthropocene proliferation, but as sites to examine the intricate relationships between life, matter, and meaning in a changing world.’ – Adam Searle, University of Cambridge

‘Anthropocene Islands establishes Pugh and Chandler as two critical and agenda-setting thinkers within island scholarship … [It] cogently argues that islands have become emblematic figures of the Anthropocene and are moreover influencing the manner in which Anthropocene thinking is developing. … a timely and essential contribution …’ – Adam Grydehøj, Editor-in-Chief, Island Studies Journal

The University of Westminster Press is the publisher of the journal Anthropocenes: Human, Inhuman, Posthuman

Anthropocene Islands – forthcoming title
CULTURE WARS: STATUES, FLAGS, STREETS AND SQUARES
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CULTURE WARS: STATUES, FLAGS, STREETS AND SQUARES

CALL FOR PAPERS/ABSTRACTS: WESTMINSTER PAPERS IN COMMUNICATION AND CULTURE
Issue Editor: Anthony McNicholas

Flags, emblems, monuments, street names, statues are some of the means by which nations and states promote themselves, both to their own citizens and to the world at large; the public face of our imagined communities. But as they seek to unify, such symbols have often been the occasion for contestation, disagreement, violence even. Empires, systems, regimes rise and fall. Societies change, and with such change comes a reassessment of societies’ symbolic life, as yesterday’s heroes become today’s villains, past triumphs a present embarrassment. The past is continually raked over, re-examined and reinterpreted, with each re-examination argued over. Examples abound from across the globe: the toppling of Rhodes’ statue in Cape Town in 2015; in Budapest, Soviet era leaders are gathered together in Memento Park. While Ukraine had by 2017 decreed the removal of all 1,320 statues of Lenin. And in Germany there are no monuments commemorating the military in the war years. In the USA, statues of Confederate leaders are being taken down; thwarted by a statute forbidding such removals, the mayor of Birmingham Alabama had one offending figure covered in plastic. Outside Delhi statues of military and British royalty languish, a ‘shambles’ in a ‘veritable dust bowl’ (Times of India) awaiting a revamp that never seems to arrive, the neglect telling its own story. In the UK the national flag and the statues of slavers are being fought over by the government and sections of the population deploying memes, hashtags and video footage whilst also appearing in official and commercial films, TV, documentary, news footage. 

Submissions are welcome covering the role of the media in all forms (from public service broadcasting to social media, feature films to advertising) exploring contested representations of such symbols and their remediation. WPCC publishes research articles, commentaries and book reviews. For guidelines see https://www.westminsterpapers.org/site/author-guidelines

Deadline for abstracts:
Please submit a 150-250 word abstract with keywords to WPCC’s submission system with 6 keywords by Monday 28 June 2021 by registering at here uploading the abstract in addition to filling in the submission details. You will receive feedback regarding encouragement to submit a full paper (a resubmission on the system) or feedback from the issue editor(s)/WPCC within 7-10 days later.

Deadline for full papers:
Full papers are expected by Monday 30 August 2021, 23:59 submitted to the WPCC system. All papers will go through double peer-review. 

Publication date: from 1 November 2021
WPCC is an open access journal and there are no fees for contributors. Published by the University of Westminster Press in conjunction with CAMRI. All content in this issue and in its archive is available free to read. 
www.westminsterpapers.org

Slave to the Algorithm? Changing the Tune
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Slave to the Algorithm? Changing the Tune

UWP are pleased to announce a forthcoming title DIGITAL PLATFORMS AND ALGORITHMIC SUBJECTIVITIES* exploring the changing nature of subjectivities produced in an era of changing boundaries between the social and personal and the economic and technological for its Critical Digital and Social Media Studies series edited by Christian Fuchs. The title is edited by Emiliana Armano, Marco Briziarelli and Elisabetta Risi (State University of Milan, University of New Mexico and IULM University of Milan respectively and will be published open access thanks to the support of Knowledge Unlatched.

*Amended 27 July 2021

DESCRIPTION

Algorithms are a form of productive power – so how may we conceptualise the newly merged terrains of social life, economy and self in a world of digital platforms? How do multiple self-quantifying practices interact with questions of class, race and gender? This book considers algorithms at work – for what purposes encoded data about behaviour, attitudes, dispositions, relationships and preferences are deployed – and black box control, platform society theory and the formation of subjectivities. It details technological structures and lived experience of algorithms and the operation of platforms in areas such as crypto-finance, production, surveillance, welfare, activism in pandemic times. Finally, it asks if platform cooperativism, collaborative design and neomutualism offer new visions. Even as problems with labour and in society mount, subjectivities and counter subjectivities here produced appear as conscious participants of change and not so much the servants of algorithmic control and dominant platforms.

CONTENTS

Introduction. Platforms, Algorithms and Subjectivities.– Emiliana Armano, Marco Briziarelli, Joseph Flores, Elisabetta Risi

Part I: Conceptualizing an algorithmic society

  1. The Californian Ideology Revisited – Lawrence Quill & Hasmet Uluorta
  2. Platform Politics and a World Beyond Catastrophe – Ned Rossiter & Soenke Zehle
  3. Platforms in Time of Pandemic– Niccolò Cuppini, Mattia Frapporti & Maurilio Pirone
  4. Domus Capitalismi. Domesticated Subjectivities in Times of Covid-19 – Marco Briziarelli & Emiliana Armano  
  5. Black Box Power Zones of Uncertainty in Algorithmic Management – Heiner Heiland 
  6. Algorithmic Management in Food Delivery Platforms, between Digital Neo-Taylorism and Enhanced Subjectivity – Emiliana Armano, Daniela Leonardi & Annalisa Murgia
  7. Extracting Free Labour– Patrick Cingolani  
  8. On Value And Labor In The Age Of Platforms– Andrea Miconi

Part II: Phenomenology and experiences. 

9. The Digital Traces of Crypto-Finance– Alberto Cossu  
10. The Social Costs of the Gig Economy and Institutional Responses. Forms of Institutional Bricolage in Italy, France, and the Netherland – Maurizio Franzini & Silvia Lucciarini
11. Plat-Firming Welfare. Examining Digital Transformation in Local Care Services – Davide Arcidiacono, Ivana Pais & Flaviano Zandonai
12.Algorithmic Prosumers – Elisabetta Risi & Riccardo Pronzato
13. Performed Subjectivities in Ranking and Recommendation Systems – Tatiana Mazali & Nicoletta Gay
14. Labour Control and Commodification Strategies Within A Food Delivery Platform in Belgium – Milena  Franke  & Valeria Pulignano
15. Emerging Forms of Sociotechnical Organisation the Case of the Fediverse – Jacopo Anderlini & Carlo Milani
16. A Workers’ Inquiry into Canvas and Zoom Disrupting the Algorithmic University – Robert Ovetz

ABOUT THE EDITORS

Emiliana Armano, PhD in Labour Studies at the Department of Social and Political Sciences at the State University of Milan. She collaborates in research into informational capitalism, knowledge work, flexibility and precariousness, with a social inquiry and coresearch methodological approach.

Marco Briziarelli is professor of Department of Communication and Journalism of the University of New Mexico. He studies critical approaches to media and communication theory, especially as these fields intersect with broader issues in political and social theory, intellectual and cultural history. Dr. Briziarelli is also interested in media and social movements and critical conceptualization of digital labor. His work has appeared in triple C: Communication, Capitalism & Critique, CommunIcation and Critical/Cultural Studies and many other journals.

Elisabetta Risi, PhD in Information Society, is Research Fellow of the Department of Communication, Arts and Media of IULM University (Milan). She teaches disciplines related to digital methods and her research interests include critical study of society and media, platform society the relationship between communication practices, identity and social change.

RELATED PUBLISHING

UWP has previously published The Spectacle 2.0 by two of the book’s editors Marco Briziarelli and Emiliana Armano in the CDSMS series, the CAMRI Policy Brief Artificial Intelligence and the Internet of Things with AI FOR EVERYONE edited by Pieter Verdegem of the University of Westminster also scheduled for 2021.