[Commlist] Conference announcement: New Materialist Informatics

Goda Klumbyte & Claude Draude are cordially inviting you to the New 
Materialist Informatics conference that will take place on 22-25 March 
2021, online, organised by the University of Kassel. The conference is 
interdisciplinary in nature and we expect it to be of interest to those 
working on media theory, arts and praxis.

Please find more information in the conference announcement below and 
online at: www.uni-kassel.de/go/NMI2021 
<http://www.uni-kassel.de/go/NMI2021>

***

New Materialist Informatics:

Computing and Worldmaking

22-25 March 2021, online

www.uni-kassel.de/go/NMI2021 <http://www.uni-kassel.de/go/NMI2021>

11th international new materialisms conference invites participants to 
investigate the possible intersections between and beyond new 
materialism and informatics. As a transversal field of inquiry, new 
materialism opens hybrid spaces between the social sciences & the 
humanities and the natural & technical sciences & engineering. 
Increasing computing power and technological advancements highlight the 
need to account for the material basis as well as material consequences 
of informatics and to ask how techno-politics and techno-epistemologies 
can be reconfigured for these complex times. This conference provides 
space to investigate these questions and bring together 
interdisciplinary research spanning information sciences and the 
(post)humanities to highlight the inter- and intra-connectedness of 
computing and worldmaking.

As the first conference dedicated to the specific intersection of new 
materialist research and informatics, this conference centres around 
questions such as: How can new materialism and informatics be brought 
together in ways that help build liveable and sustainable 
techno-lifeworlds? What new perspectives on contemporary crises might 
emerge at such an intersection and beyond? What kind of conceptual and 
methodological tools are needed for new materialist informatics design 
and research? The conference includes and goes beyond the new 
materialist readings of computing and computational artefacts and 
generates innovative perspectives on how techno-worldmaking can be 
performed from a new materialist perspective.

Programme

Participants will have a chance to attend hands-on workshops on March 
22, 2021, paper presentations and keynotes on 23-25 March 2021 and 
demonstrations throughout the event. For full programme, see 
www.uni-kassel.de/go/NMI2021 <http://www.uni-kassel.de/go/NMI2021>.

Keynote Lectures

+++ “Vibrant Subjects: Posthuman Perspectives on Nourishing Design” - 
Shaowen Bardzell, Professor of Information Sciences and Technology at 
Penn State University's College of Information Sciences and Technology, USA

+++ “New Players on the World-Stage: A New Materialist Approach to 
Robotics and HRI” - Maaike Bleeker, Professor in Theatre Studies in the 
Department of Media & Culture Studies, Utrecht University, Netherlands

+++ “Authenticating Figures: Algorithms and the New Politics of 
Recognition” - Wendy H.K. Chun, Canada 150 Research Chair in New Media 
at the School of Communication, Simon Fraser University, Canada

+++ “Notes on the Three Stages of the Algorithmic Condition; The Ethe of 
Mimesis, Feminicity, and Bioinformatics” - Felicity Colman, Professor of 
Media Arts and Associate Dean of Research for the London College of 
Fashion at University of the Arts, UK

+++ “Knowing-Making Accessibility: Crip and Unfinished Technosciences in 
Physical and Virtual Worlds” - Aimi Hamraie, Assistant Professor of 
Medicine, Health, and Society and American Studies at the Center for 
Medicine, Health, and Society, Vanderbilt University, USA

+++ On material conditions and effects of the entanglements between race 
and technology (Exact title TBC) - Safiya Umoja Noble, Associate 
Professor, Department of Information Studies and Co-Director of the UCLA 
Center for Critical Internet Inquiry (C2i2), University of California, 
Los Angeles (UCLA), USA

+++ Roundtable discussion “Speculative Materialities, Indigenous 
Worldings and Decolonial Futures in Computing & Design” - with 
contributions by Outi Laiti, University of Lapland, Finland; Luiza Prado 
de O. Martins, artist, writer and researcher, Germany; Femke Snelting, 
Constant, Belgium; and Caroline J. Ward, JUST AI (LSE & Ada Lovelace 
Institute), UK

Conference Registration

Conference registration is now open! Conference registrations include 
access to all NMI2021 events.  The conference has moderate all-inclusive 
participant fees. The income from fees will be used towards honoraria 
for keynotes and respondents and, depending on availability, to support 
artists, designers and presenters in need of support. Visit our website 
www.uni-kassel.de/go/NMI2021 <http://www.uni-kassel.de/go/NMI2021> for 
more information.

Conference Themes

The conveners of New Materialist Informatics invite to approach these 
questions from a multiplicity of disciplinary perspectives, including 
the humanities and social sciences, design, engineering and computer 
science. Around 80 contributions, including workshops and 
demonstrations, are to be presented on themes that include new 
materialist informatics theories, concepts and methodologies, design 
interventions and praxes, contemporary issues regarding material effects 
and conditions of informatics and future perspectives for research and 
design.

Organisers and Contact

The conference is organised by the Gender/ Diversity in Informatics 
Systems Research Group (GeDIS) and the Research Center for Information 
System Design (ITeG), University of Kassel, Germany. If you have any 
questions, please email us at (NMI2021 /at/ uni-kassel.de) 
<mailto:(NMI2021 /at/ uni-kassel.de)>.

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