[Commlist] CFP: Transformations: Inhuman Algorithms

*Transformations Issue 34 CFP*

*Inhuman Algorithms*

Algorithms are integral to a digital, networked, automated society. 
Thrown into the public spotlight by a certain high profile search 
engine, algorithms are increasingly recognised to exercise agency in 
practices such as governance, surveillance, online personalisation, 
medicine, design, high frequency trading, credit scoring and plagiarism. 
Computational machines make decisions about things, people, places and 
experiences, and humans learn to address algorithms.

Algorithms have inhuman capacities. They do not become distracted, 
tired, impatient or emotional. At the same time the algorithm’s inhuman 
abilities can be understood as a desirable improvement on human skills. 
Algorithms are inhuman forces that bring social, political, material and 
cultural formations into being, generating and extinguishing 
possibilities. Their inhumanism transmutes ideas of the human and 
demands new (post)humanisms.

This special issue of Transformations seeks contributions that address 
the inhuman algorithm. We invite submissions in the areas of critical 
and cultural studies, media studies, anthropology and social science, 
science and technology studies, and creative arts research. Possible 
topics include but are not limited to:

  * Inhuman excesses of the algorithm – numeration, repetition,
    information, recursion, logics.
  * Human-algorithmic ensembles and demarcations of the human and 
algorithm.
  * Inhuman pasts and futures of the algorithm – precedents, precursors,
    prospects.
  * Elites of algorithmic culture.
  * Algorithmic recognition and its anticipation.
  * The temporality of algorithms – real time input, prediction, speed.
  * The politics of the algorithmic subjectivities and identities.
  * Trust, opaqueness and transparency in algorithms.
  * The intensification and modification of inhumane practices (poverty,
    racism, gender bias) by algorithmic processes.
  * The co-evolution of algorithms, code and big data.
  * The algorithm’s embedding in and of the social – surveillance,
    personalisation.
  * Hybrid and collaborative human-algorithm cognition.
  * Defining and knowing algorithms.
  * The materiality of algorithms – computers, sensors, geography,
    connections.

Abstracts (200-400 words) are due April 30 2019, with a view to submit 
articles by 30 July 30 2019.

Abstracts should be forwarded to: (editor /at/ transformationsjournal.org) 
<mailto:(editor /at/ transformationsjournal.org)>

Dr Erika Kerruish I School of Arts and Social Sciences I Southern Cross 
University I Locked Mail Bag 4 I Coolangatta Qld 4225 I Ph: 07 5589 3172 
I Email: (erika.kerruish /at/ scu.edu.au) <mailto:(erika.kerruish /at/ scu.edu.au)> I 
CRICOS Provider No:01241G

Co-editor: http://www.transformationsjournal.org 
<http://www.transformationsjournal.org/>

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