[Commlist] New book: Algorithms and Subjectivity

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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