The 2019 GEM Lab Seminar in Media and Political Theory* showcases works in progress examining the paranoid potentialities of digital media technologies and the computational imagination. By highlighting new attentional forms, which correspond to the creative and productive side of paranoia, we investigate strategies of coping and making do with the increasingly complex world we live in. How might the productivity of paranoiac knowledge provide entry points for grappling with current crises in cognitive and imaginative forms, as well as larger technological, financial, or political flows? How can we contribute to or reframe debates about digital cultures and their politics by investigating the technological mechanisms at the heart of contemporary paranoia: from data-violence and algorithmic segregation to new attention economies and uncertain futures. The workshop asks how paranoid epistemologies may serve as a method to analyze cultural and political shifts shored up by digital media technologies.
Schedule
April 25th – Keynote + Reception
5.00pm Nathan Su (Forensic Architecture): »The Digital Media Complex« [EV 1.605]
6:30-8pm Reception with Dr. Chris Salter at the Speculative Life Lab: »Totem – or can an inert thing develop autonomy and consciousness?« [EV 10.625]
April 26-27th – Workshop – EV 11.705
Friday, April 26th, 9.30am-5:00pm
9.30am – 9.50am Welcome
9.50am – 10.40am SESSION 1
Wendy Hui Kyong Chun: »Authenticating Paranoia«
10.40am – 10.50am Coffee Break
10.50am – 12.30pm SESSION 2
Johannes Bruder: »Neuropsychologies of the Paranoid Mind and the Technologies They Breed«
Joshua Neves: »The Internet of People and Things«
12.30pm – 1.30pm Lunch Break
1.30pm – 3.10pm SESSION 3
Tung-Hui Hu: »What to Do When It’s Too Late«
Rebecca Holt: »Power and Paranoia in the Age of PornHub«
3.10pm – 3.20pm Coffee Break
3.20pm – 5.00pm SESSION 4
Nishant Shah: »The Paranoia of Plenty:
Politics of the Disconnected Subject«
Jade Davis: »Death of the Cyborg«
Saturday, April 27th, 9:30am-5:00pm
9.30am – 9.50am Recap
9.50am – 10.40am SESSION 1
Orit Halpern: »The Planetary Bet«
10.40am – 10.50am Coffee Break
10.50am – 12.30pm SESSION 2
Brian Holmes: »Capital Breakdown: From Globalization to Bioregions«
Patrick Smith: »Counter Forensics/Counter Logistics»
12.30pm – 1.30pm Lunch Break
1.30pm – 3.10pm SESSION 3
Alessandra Renzi: »In Media We Trust«
Ishita Tiwary, »Unsettling News: Newstrack as the Video Event«
3.10pm – 3.20pm Coffee Break
3.20pm – 5.00pm SESSION 4
Clemens Apprich: »‘Hey Google, repeat after me’ – Some Thoughts on Machine Animation«
Elisa Giardina Papa: »The Computer Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. Visual and Associative Agnosia in Machine Vision«
