felix's blog

Book Out: Digital Condition (Polity Press)

By felix on 15 Feb 2018

I'm very happy my new book (a translation of Kultur der Digitalität) has just been published by Polity Press.

In the book I argue that referentiality, communality, and algorithmicity have become the characteristic cultural forms of the digital condition because more and more people – in more and more segments of life and by means of increasingly complex technologies – are actively (voluntarily and/or compulsorily) participating in the negotiation of social meaning. They are thus reacting to the demands of a chaotic, overwhelming sphere of information and thereby contributing to its greater expansion. It is the ubiquity of these cultural forms that makes it possible to speak of the digital condition in the singular.

The goals pursued in these cultural forms, however, are as diverse, contradictory, and conflicted as society itself. It would therefore be equally false to assume uniformity or an absence of alternatives in the unfolding of social and political developments. On the contrary, the idea of a lack of alternatives is an ideological assertion that is itself part of a specific political agenda. Indeed, advanced democracies are faced with a profound choice, to continue their long slide towards post-democratic authoritarianism or reinvent democracy for the digital condition.

You can get it from the publisher (UK, US), from Amazon (UK, US), or you local bookseller (UK, US).

The great cover image is by the Dutch artist Bernaut Smilde, from the series Nimbus, Probe #6, 2010.

Updates

Anthony Mandal offers an extensive summary and appraisal of the book in his review of the field "Digital Humanities. The Year’s Work in Critical and Cultural Theory" for Oxford university press.
A reviewer in the European Journal of Communication (Vol 33, Issue 5)
calls the book "thought-provoking".
In place of a review, Clemens Apprich did a long interview on the book for First Monday (23:8)
A reviewer at ITNOW, calls the book "prescient" and concludes "the book is timely in its provision of a contemporary world view and where it appears to be heading, but with a potential alternative scenario. Not a speed read but one to ponder as one slowly digests. The absence of an index is a nuisance, if one wished to refer back, unless one makes copious notes whilst reading, as I did." ITNOW, 40:3, p.64
In a review for the British Computer Society, Mick Phythian gives the book 8/10 points.
"absolutely insightful" a very positive review by Guido Koller for Collaborative Digital History
"This book combines the scale and depth of Manuel Castells's research, with that astonishingly revealing vision of a Zygmunt Bauman," writes Pau Todo in his review on Good Reads.

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Solidarität und digitale Gesellschaft: Impulse

By felix on 12 Oct 2019

"Welchen Einfluss hat die Digitalisierung auf die Solidarität? Die Stiftung Sanitas Krankenversicherung stellt Studien vor und bietet Experten und Think Tanks eine Plattform für Diskussionsbeiträge."

Mein Beitrag, ein Interview, beschreibt wie durch die Digitalisierung eine neue Infrastruktur für soziale Prozesse geschaffen wurde und welche Potentiale für neue Formen der Solidarität vorhanden sind.

Interview in De, Fr, It.

interview

31.10. Das Formular (Vienna)

By felix on 11 Oct 2019

event

24.10. G5 Infoabend. Wer hat den Überblick im Strahlenmeer (Langenbruck)

By felix on 11 Oct 2019

event

23.10. Die Open Dimension von Citizen Science (Zürich)

By felix on 11 Oct 2019

Ringvorlesung Partizipative Wissenschaftsakademie

«Citizen Science» und andere partizipative Forschungsansätze bekommen seit einigen Jahren immer grössere Aufmerksamkeit. Nicht zuletzt haben technologische Entwicklungen zu einem Boom in der Bürgerwissenschaft geführt. Die Ziele der Einbeziehung von Bürgerinnen und Bürgern in die Wissenschaft sind vielfältig und reichen von der Stärkung benachteiligter Gruppen bis hin zur Vergrösserung von Datenbeständen.

In der Ringvorlesung diskutieren wir, was Citizen Science als Teil einer transformativen Wissenschaft ausmacht. Referent*innen und Diskutant*innen aus unterschiedlichen Disziplinen hinterfragen: Wie kann Citizen Science zu gesellschaftlich relevanter Forschung beitragen? Welches Potenzial haben partizipative Ansätze um den Dialog zwischen Gesellschaft und Forschung zu stärken? Was bedeutet exzellente Forschung für Citizen Science Projekte?

Ziel der Ringvorlesung ist es, ein differenziertes Verständnis des Konzeptes Citizen Science und dessen transformativem Potenzial zu diskutieren. Die Ringvorlesung wird von der Partizipativen Wissenschaftsakademie gemeinsam mit dem Citizen Science Center Zürich organisiert.

Die Open Dimension von Citizen Science
Mittwoch, 23. Oktober 2019, 18:15 Uhr bis 19:45 Uhr

Mit Gabi Schneider, swissuniversities, Bern, Aktionsplan Open Access
Diskutant: Prof. Dr. Felix Stalder, Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, Professor Digitale Kultur und Theorien der Vernetzung

https://www.uzh.ch/cmsssl/de/outreach/events/rv/2019hs/citizen-science.html

event

17 - 19.10. Deep Horizon: The Cultures of Forecasting (Vienna)

By felix on 11 Oct 2019

October 17-19, 2019. Kunsthalle Wien Karlsplatz. PROGRAM ➔ ABSTRACTS ➔

event

Deep Horizon: The Culture of Forecasting (Radiogespräch)

By felix on 07 Oct 2019

OPEN SCORES. How to program the Commons

By felix on 10 Sep 2019

21 September – 12 October 2019
panke.gallery, Berlin

This exhibition brings together 16 practices through which artists articulate their own forms of (digital) commons. From online archives, to digital tools/infrastructure and educational formats, the projects envision a (post-)digital culture in which notions of collaboration, free access to knowledge, sustainable use of shared resources and data privacy are central.

For the exhibition, artists have developed a SCORE relating to their practice. A SCORE can have different meanings: It can be a general instruction, a working instruction, a performance instruction or an operating instruction. In any case, it is meant to lead to a realization of an intended action and as such is an interface between a human actor and an object/material/machine. And a SCORE can also be linked to a technical HOWTO document, in that it contains information on how to perform a specific task.