Shintaro Miyazaki (Basel) on "Below the Data is the Signal – A (Marxist) Rhythmanalysis of Data in Motion"

In the lecture I will update my work based on the notion of algorhythmics – which was inspired by the context of German media archaeology (Wolfgang Ernst) and was extended towards the notion of media ecology – with new aspects inspired by Henri Lefebvre’s concept of rhythmanalysis and Wendy Hui Kyong Chun’s work on pattern discrimination and habitual media. The lecture is thus highly preliminary and builds an important step for me in order to extend media archaeology towards a critique of techno-capitalism and media (design) activism. 

The lecture series on “Data Practices” explores data “in motion”, both theoretically, empirically and methodology. The proliferation of data-intensive media requires researchers to develop their conceptual vocabulary and socio-technical understanding of data production, calculation and their underlying practices and infrastructures. Throughout the lecture series, we ask how a praxeological account can enable us to account for the movement and transformation of data. We consider data practices as those practices involved in the making, calculation, storage, accounting and valuation of data among others which are socio-material and entangled with infrastructures. The lecture series is jointly organised by the DFG graduate school “Locating Media” and the DFG cooperative research centre “Media of Cooperation”.