Archive for publications, February 2022

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[Commlist] New book: Algorithms and Subjectivity

Tue Feb 01 11:18:22 GMT 2022




Algorithms and Subjectivity*
The Subversion of Critical Knowledge (Routledge, 2022)

Eran Fisher
Series: /Routledge Focus on Digital Media and Culture/

This book interrogates the relationship between algorithms as epistemic devices and modern notions of subjectivity. Over the past few decades, as the instrumentalization of algorithms has created knowledge that informs our decisions, preferences, tastes, and actions, and the very sense of who we are, they have also undercut, and arguably undermined, the Enlightenment-era ideal of the subject. Fisher finds that as algorithms enable a reality in which knowledge is created by circumventing the participation of the self, they also challenge contemporary notions of subjectivity. Through four case-studies, this book provides an empirical and theoretical investigation of this transformation, analyzing how algorithmic knowledge differs from the ideas of critical knowledge which emerged during modernity – Fisher argues that algorithms create a new type of knowledge, which in turn changes our fundamental sense of self and our concept of subjectivity.

TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Introduction: Subjectivity Redundant
1. Can Algorithmic Knowledge be Critical?
2. How Algorithms Think About Humans? (with Yoav Mehozay )
3. Can Algorithms Tell Us Who We Are?
4. Can Algorithms Make Aesthetic Judgments? (with Norma Musih )
5. Do Algorithms Have a Right to the City?
Epilogue

Eran Fisher is Associate Professor at the Department of Sociology, Political Science, and Communication at the Open University of Israel. His books include /Media and New Capitalism in the Digital Age/ (2010), /Internet and Emotions/ (2014; co-edited with Tova Benski), and /Reconsidering Value and Labour in the Digital Age/ (2015; co-edited with Christian Fuchs).

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