Gibt es ein Motto, das das Prinzip einer verwalteten Welt auf eine Formel bringt, dann den altrömischen Prozessgrundsatz: Quod non est in actis, non est in mundo. Bereits in antiker Justiz und Verwaltung herrschte jenes Primat der Verschriftlichung, das aus einer Handlung oder Aussage eine Rechtssache und einen Geschäftsfall macht. Akten sind seither nicht nur die Grundlage von Bürokratien im Sinne Max Webers‚ sondern von Verwaltungs- und Rationalisierungsmaßnahmen in diversen (etwa pädagogischen oder medizinischen, militärischen oder wirtschaftlichen) Institutionen.

Translanguaging, a strategic tool for teaching and learning in the German classrooms: The case of multilingual Cameroonian immigrants.

Translanguaging is a pedagogical program where two or more languages are simultaneously used in the classroom. One language is used to teach and instruct the students, but the student’s output is sometimes allowed to be in their L1/Mother tongue. This practice gives the students” a time to shine”. Students can be encouraged to communicate and make meaning by drawing on and intermingling linguistic features from the different languages in their repertoire.Translanguaging helps students and teachers fully understand the communicative repertoires they bring to the learning arena. It also helps the teacher identify how to draw on those repertoires for successful educational practices for the students concerned. This thesis, therefore, recommends translanguaging in the educational process of immigrants. “If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart”- Nelson Mandela.

About the lecture series

In view of the current political situation, especially the war in Ukraine and the protest movement in Iran, the lecture series “Research at Risk!” is an invitation to discuss the challenges of research in media, theater and cultural studies in crises and war regions beyond national and cultural boundaries. We have invited experts from various disciplinary and geo-political situations/positions to present their research on topics related to the wars and crises in our world and how this affects their research.

The lectures focus on research practices in war and crises as well as on scientific/activist work on war and crises. Specifically, our speakers address the questions of how research, education and study can be carried out under hostile conditions and what influence war, political oppression, diaspora and other crisis-related impacts have on the production of knowledge. Which forms of knowledge and cultures receive credit in the academic world, and which are excluded? Where do scientists and students place the significance of the media when faced with these circumstances?

The event is a continuation of an initiative from within German Media Studies to support scholars at risk affected by the ongoing Russian invasion on Ukraine. We want to use the attention currently being raised by the war in Ukraine to give stage to researchers from various zones of war and risk across Europe and worldwide, including Iran, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ukraine, Turkey, Kamerun, and Afghanistan.

The lecture series "Research at Risk" is a cooperation project of German media scholars and supported by: the CRC 1187 “Media of Cooperation”, the CRC 1472 “Transformationen des Populären“ and the Media Studies department at the University of Siegen, the Graduiertenkolleg 2132 “Das Dokumentarische” and the Faculty for Philology at Ruhr University Bochum, and the European Media Studies at the University Flensburg.

Guests are welcome to register via Mail ‘Send an E-mail’

The workshop is a pre-discussion of the lecture on the same topic exploring how “Technology” is a category vernacular (emic) to modernity which, when used, inscribes the phenomena it refers to within an utilitarian, rationalist and Eurocentric frame. Building on the works of the Francophone Technologie Culturelle, the paper suggests going back to Marcel Mauss’s definition of “technical acts”, focalising on the issue of “efficacy”. The paper claims that it is by taking seriously the efficacy according to the actors themselves, whether computer engineers, long yam growers or shamans, that one can built a methodological frame able to empirically analyse technical (or ritual or aesthetic) phenomena, and their profound axiological import, without sacrificing their material or conceptual diversity, or their spatial or temporal complexity. It opens up with a call for an anthropology of technicity and technodiversity which analyse the different modalities of actions and relations between humans and their milieus.

*As the workshop is an internal event, external guests please contact Dr. Johannes Schick by email for registration, indicating their academic title, full name, their institution, their official email address and the title of the event they wish to attend.

This lecture explores how “Technology” is a category vernacular (emic) to modernity which, when used, inscribes the phenomena it refers to within an utilitarian, rationalist and Eurocentric frame. Building on the works of the Francophone Technologie Culturelle, the paper suggests going back to Marcel Mauss’s definition of “technical acts”, focalising on the issue of “efficacy”. The paper claims that it is by taking seriously the efficacy according to the actors themselves, whether computer engineers, long yam growers or shamans, that one can built a methodological frame able to empirically analyse technical (or ritual or aesthetic) phenomena, and their profound axiological import, without sacrificing their material or conceptual diversity, or their spatial or temporal complexity. It opens up with a call for an anthropology of technicity and technodiversity which analyse the different modalities of actions and relations between humans and their milieus.

See also:

15|11|22 The normative order of sensing – Lecture with Lorenza Mondada
24|1|23 ‚One last round!‘ Towards a Critical Ethnomethodology of Climate Change – Lecture with Thomas Scheffer

"Hacking into Aesthetics and Politics of (AI-)Avatarization and algorithmic faciality"

In Neil Stephanson's 1992 dystopian sci-fi novel "Snowcrash," the Metaverse is an escape from the reality of the novel's main character, Hiro, a nearly broke computer hacker and pizza delivery driver who spends much of his time "there." He accesses the Metaverse by wearing goggles and earphones and appears within the Virtual world as his own customized Avatar. In computing, an Avatar is a graphical representation of a user or the user's character, a playable character or persona, a "playable figure" -besides a prosthetic marionette. A digital Avatar can also be a virtual assistant, a representative in the digital world, such as the Metaverse. This standard working definition of the Avatar leads to theoretical tensions between primarily computational or computer-generated gamification (games) and ludification (human play and its ludic actors) and respective control and degrees of freedom.

The use of artificial intelligence (AI) to create avatars with human-like facial features can impact how we interact with technology and each other significantly and how we become others. These avatars, which can be used as virtual assistants or in gaming and different virtual environments, can mimic human behavior and emotions (cf Ekman´s FACS), leading to the possibility of anthropomorphism. While interacting with LLM-based conversational agents (such as Chat-GPT) may create the illusion of being in the presence of a thinking creature, these systems are fundamentally not like humans. They can be inscrutable, presenting a mix of superhuman and inhuman abilities. It may take time for us to learn how to handle these new kinds of entities and resist the temptation of anthropomorphism, especially if endowed with algorithmic faciality. However, the use of AI avatars also raises questions about agency, control, and dependency, as well as the potential for manipulating individuals through these avatars. The use of AI to create realistic avatars also raises aesthetic concerns, such as the influence of an avatar's "cuteness" or likability on people's preferences and the potential for reinforcing normativity of specific beauty standards and aesthetic manipulation of behavior.

Additionally, using AI avatars in work and social situations brings up issues of identity and blurring boundaries between the virtual and physical worlds. As AI technology continues to advance and the use of AI avatars becomes more widespread, it will be essential to consider this development's ethical and social implications. Ganism and other computer-generated or machine-learning algorithms produce sociality via platformed faciality as the mimetic algorithmic social-political designed system of platformed digital life without alterity experience, present -in contrast- in between humans' face-to-face encounters (Levinas). This talk will hack with artistic and activist dramaturgies/strategies into algorithmic faciality.

Alexander Gerner (PhD) is a playwright and researcher in philosophy of science and technology at the Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon. He holds a PhD in History and Philosophy of Science (Faculty of Sciences, University of Lisbon 2012) where he is Vice-head of the Research Group RG3- Philosophy of Technology, Human Sciences Art and Society at the Centre for Philosophy of Sciences, University of Lisbon (CFCUL). Gerner teaches, among others in “History and Philosophy of Technology“ and "Computer and Society" at FCUL. At the moment he is writing on a book on aesthetic, anthropotechnical, political and ethical impact of AI Avatars. He investigates human technology, social resonance, ethics and AI aesthetics in a critical approach to algorithmic rationalities in his research project "Hacking Humans. Dramaturgies and Technologies to become other.“

About the Lecture Series

This semester we focus on concepts that can critically address the ongoing crises of the digital age (e.g. information, climate, resources, discrimination) and might help to develop new critical practices, an understanding of the present and the future that we are facing. These concepts are Aesthetics & Evidence, Critique and Imagineries, (Data) Governance and Activism, (Interactive/value-sensitive) Design and Decolonialism. Even though all of these concepts deserve a lecture series on their own, we chose to have for each of these topics one lecture in order to create a kaleidoscopic and interdisciplinary perspective on what critical practices and future “Politics of Data and Semi-Autonomy” can look like.

The lecture series takes place as a hybrid event Wednesday from 2 to 4 pm c.t.. External guests can join online by registering here.

See also:

23|11|22 – Investigative Aesthetics with Matthew Fuller
7|12|22 – Sensing Machines with Chris Salter
18|1|23 – Politics of Data – Politics of Semi-Autonomy with Orit Halpern