This reading group will examine historical, material, relational and political economic approaches to ‘data’, focusing on both the concept-work that goes into data and forms of power that produce and are produced by data practices. We will read histories of data involving etymology and political contexts; contemporary political economic problematizations of data; works interrogating governmentality and governance by data including sites of ‘datafication’ and critical legal approaches to governance by data; and emerging imaginaries for using and making data. The readings include historical scholarship, science and technology studies (STS) scholarship, legal scholarship, works from politics, visual and new media studies as well as corporate heritage literature and organization reports.
When: Friday afternoons, every 4 weeks, 2:00pm-4:00pm
Where: UNSW Sydney Kensington campus (location TBC)
How to join: Please email Dr. Sonia Qadir s.qadir@unsw.edu.au or Rachel Kennedy rachel.kennedy@student.unsw.edu.au
Image: Mimi Ọnụọha, ‘The Library of Missing Datasets (series), 2016 – ongoing’, Installation of steel filing cabinets and folders. Image used with permission.