Critical Media Studies Lecture Series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Andrew Chadwick (Loughborough University) | Website

INFORMATION

Research on digitally-mediated engagement has been central to the social science of the internet since the 1990s. Not only has it generated significant theoretical innovations, it has impacted democratic practice across the world. But today, after a decade of upheaval caused by social media's dysfunctional impacts, where stands the field?

COORDINATES

Date:

Wednesday, 27.05.2026

Time:

16:00 – 17:00

Place:

MSA 3.120

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m3fe0b7acb5fb1423af70cc3ea54422af

Critical Media Studies Lecture Series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Verónica Pájaro (Universitet i Agder) | Website

INFORMATION

With over 200,000 Instagram followers, @ladylemon is a cosplayer, anti-feminist influencer, and National Deputy for Javier Milei's libertarian party La Libertad Avanza. In her official accounts, ladylemon shares short video excerpts from her violent outbursts at the National Congress, alongside bikini and AI-generated portraits in costume. The aesthetics and performance of cosplay subcultures have been appropriated and rebranded as central elements of the libertarian political aesthetic.

In this talk I wish to examine the gendered and racialized aesthetics of social media cosplay performances by women in Argentina's far-right, using Lemoine as a central case study. I analyze how cosplay aesthetics and meme culture are strategically appropriated to produce a sexualized political persona aligned with anti-feminist, anti-abortion, and anti-vaccine discourses. While these performances depart from familiar right-wing feminine archetypes such as the "tradwife", they nonetheless reproduce and exploit discourses of feminine submission and objectification recognizable from global far right movements. Drawing on intersectional feminism and digital ethnography, the lecture invites to explore how postmodern reactionary populism (Tebaldi, 2021) is mobilized by the women of the right in Argentina, while raising questions about researching far-right digital spaces.

COORDINATES

Date:

Wednesday, 22.04.2026

Time:

14:00 – 15:00

Place:

MSA 3.120

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m3fe0b7acb5fb1423af70cc3ea54422af

Critical Media Studies Lecture Series

SPEAKER

Piotr Marczynski (Université Libre de Bruxelles) | Website

INFORMATION

Research into online communities resists easy methodological fixes. Defining the contour of the 'community' carries problems on its own, let alone situating it within the broader hybrid media ecosystem in which platform and legacy media intersect. This talk proposes a networked analytic approach that integrates social network analysis (SNA) with digital ethnography and discourse analysis as a coherent, transferable design for media studies research. Rather than treating SNA as a standalone computational technique, the talk situates it within a broader mixed-methods framework, while reflecting on what is gained and lost by approaching communities this way. The approach is grounded and illustrated through original research on the "Barbarian Right", a far-right subculture on X (formerly Twitter), which embeds reactionary ideology into health and wellness content. This case brings the method to life while opening broader questions about the rightward shift of Big Tech and proliferating online radicalization channels for young men.

COORDINATES

Date:

Wednesday, 01.04.2026

Time:

14:00 – 15:00

Place:

MSA 3.120

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m3fe0b7acb5fb1423af70cc3ea54422af

Critical Media Studies Lecture Series

SPEAKER

Dr. Jaspal Singh (Open University) | Website

INFORMATION

The performance of the white Australian breakdancer B-Girl Raygun at the 2024 Paris Olympics quickly went viral, sparking widespread debate both within and beyond Hip Hop communities. Reactions ranged from ridicule, infantilisation and misogyny to questions about representation and accusations of minstrelsy/blackfacing. Within Hip Hop Kulture, especially among breakers, the viral spread of Raygun's performance seemed to have brought about deep-seated anxieties about cultural appropriation, misrepresentation and the ongoing influence of colonial power. These anxieties were, as I will argue, expressed in debates around raciogendered authenticity. Drawing on an autoethnographic approach, this talk traces how these discussions unfolded in real time across different audiences. It explores what this moment reveals about how media virality shapes public understandings of culture, identity, institutions and authenticity in a global context.

COORDINATES

Date:

Wednesday, 25.03.2026

Time:

16:00 – 17:00

Place:

MSA 3.120

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m3fe0b7acb5fb1423af70cc3ea54422af

Critical Media Studies Lecture Series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Dominika Baran (Duke) | Website

INFORMATION

This talk presents two case studies of media discourse in Poland, focusing on theories and methods that draw from Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and related approaches, and on how these can help us examine and interpret how words can be strategically appropriated, redefined, and recontextualized. The central thesis on which this talk builds is that meanings – of words, phrases, and concepts – are never stable and final, but rather dynamic and negotiable. They can become sites of ideological, political, and cultural struggle (Laclau 1990). Discourse analysis provides an excellent and concrete tool through which we can examine just how users of language – be they politicians, journalists, influencers, activists, or anyone else – employ tactics that shape meanings in particular ways. The two case studies discussed in this talk examine media discourse surrounding LGBTQ+ issues and what the "phantasm" of "gender ideology" (Butler 2019) in Poland. The first analyzes how the lexeme tęcza "rainbow" is used across liberal and rightwing media outlets in Poland and argues that it has become a floating signifier through which the contrasting visions of Poland's history and future are being fought over. The second offers a detailed discourse analysis of an email newsletter sent out to subscribers by a far-right Polish organization, Center for Life and Family, in which language – including mentions of "rainbow" as a stand-in for "gender/LGBTQ+" – is manipulated in ways that construct a particular, cisheteropatriarchal and Catholic nationalist version of social reality.

COORDINATES

Date:

Thursday, 19.03.2026

Time:

16:00 – 17:00

Place:

-- online only --

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m096de4b8981ce41e0ff1e6b65994867c

International workshop at the University of Luxembourg | 06.03.2026

This workshop, organized by Peter Gilles, a professor of Luxembourgish linguistics and the creator of LuxASR, brings together international experts working on language technology and digital tools for small languages and varieties, with a focus on Frisian, Limbourgish, and Luxemburgish. The workshop aims to promote an exchange among experts regarding the unique challenges of developing language technology in small language contexts, as well as the potential of small language natural language processing (NLP) to enhance language technology development. Specifically, this involves improving the management of linguistic variation in models, preserving cultural diversity in the digital age, and offering innovative, tailored technical solutions for small language communities, such as AI text generation, automatic translation, and speech recognition.

Guiding questions for contributions

• What are the most important digital achievements for your language/speech community so far and who actually benefits from them?
• Which digital tools, resources or techniques are most urgently needed in your context?
• Which constraints are characteristic for small languages?
• How can AI be used productively and safely for small languages, especially when engaging with Big Tech?
• What kinds of partnerships (public institutions, NGOs, companies) are useful, and how can they respect GDPR, copyright and community ownership of language data?
• How can applied, community-oriented digital work be balanced with general academic research requirements?
• In which way are digital tools enhancing academic research through crowd-sourcing and citizen science?
• What would sustainable digital support for your language look like in 5–10 years and what needs to happen to achieve it?

Schedule

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Martina Heßler (Darmstadt University) | Website

INFORMATION

Dass Softwaresysteme niemals fehlerfrei sind, ist eine Binsenweisheit, die inzwischen niemanden erstaunt oder aufregt. In den 1970er und 1980er Jahren führte die Erkenntnis, dass Software niemals fehlerfrei ist, noch zu aufgeregten und besorgten Debatten. Viele Softwareentwickler warnten vor den Konsequenzen fehlerhafter Software, Listen und Kategorien von Softwarefehlern wurden erstellt, Strategien zur Fehlerbeherrschung entwickelt - und inzwischen funktionieren Softwaresysteme "im Großen und Ganzen", wie ein Softwareentwickler betonte.

Aus historischer Perspektive stellen Softwarefehler allerdings eine Zäsur im Wissen über technologische Fehler dar. Das Nichtwissen und das Nichtverstehen von Softwarefehlern sind historisch neuartig und werden, so eine These des Vortrags, in ihren möglichen gesellschaftlichen Konsequenzen unterschätzt. Der Vortrag thematisiert verschiedene Formen des Nichtwissens und des Nichtverstehens von Softwarefehlern und fragt nach den gesellschaftlichen Konsequenzen dieses Nichtwissens. Dies geschieht an historischen Beispielen. Der Vortrag endet mit einem Ausblick auf aktuelle KI-Entwicklungen.

COORDINATES

Date:

Thursday, 20.11.2025

Time:

16:00 – 17:00

Place:

MSA 4.150

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m903d0ada6adb75a32f4d30dd564b006d

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Christoph Purschke (Uni.lu) | Website

INFORMATION

The emergence of the digitally enriched lifeworld has seemingly led to the ubiquity of language in all aspects of digitally anchored practices, be it in chatbot applications, social media, or large-scale archives. At the same time, it is evident that digitization, datafication, and economization technologies are in many ways displacing language from its traditional functions in organizing human culture. This includes its medial binding (e.g. in social media), its semiotic quality (e.g. in chatbot applications) and technical representation (e.g. through data processing), but also the political dependence of the presence and pertinence of languages on available 'training data' and the interests of tech companies, as well as the decoupling of the epistemic content of statements from linguistic performance. These issues will be discussed from a theoretical perspective.

COORDINATES

Date:

Thursday, 25.09.2025

Time:

16:00 – 17:00

Place:

MSA 4.190

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m20546071aee77c0a58578c22196c06f5

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Dirk Hovy (Bocconi University) | Website

INFORMATION

Why do some AI models stand out in a sea of them, while others do not? Most of the models we interact with, for email sorting, movie recommendations, and schedule organization, go unnoticed. Only a few captivate our attention, and then often resemble humans in their capabilities. Anthropomorphizing models, such as those in robots and text-generators like Chat-GPT, helps us understand and accept complex systems and provides parameters for interacting with them. However, it results in exaggerated claims, overlooked issues, and misplaced fears. This talk examines the state of AI models, dispelling myths by exploring their actual capabilities and limitations. Through signing apes, flirtatious smart speakers, scheming octopuses, and algorithmic painters, we will explore why expecting AI to behave like humans can lead to challenges and misunderstandings.

Understanding AI objectively allows us to appreciate both the incredible feats achieved by these models without human bodies and brains, as well as our complex and often underappreciated human abilities. This investigation also helps address current societal concerns: Will artificial intelligence (AI) replace jobs? Could it pose a threat? How do AI's stereotyping tendencies reflect our own social biases, and how does this impact responsible technology use? Dipping into psychology, philosophy, machine learning, and AI history to separate fact from fiction, we will explore why AI is not inherently good or evil, but rather a tool that reflects our own complexities, and raises the questions: what do we mean by AI, and what does it mean to be human?

COORDINATES

Date:

Thursday, 09.10.2025

Time:

16:00 – 17:00

Place:

MSA 3.220

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m2518b6d50ded5899ed9014982657be44

Program for the second semester 2025

Here is the list of upcoming dates in our talk series CuCo Lab Conversations. All events take place on Belval campus and via Webex. Note that we have a new time slot for the talks, Thursday, 16:00 to 17:00.

• 25.09. | Christoph Purschke (Luxembourg): Last night of the prompts. On technology and cultural regression | Info
• 09.10. | Dirk Hovy (Milano): Artificial Illusion: what it means to be human for the future of AI | Info
• 20.11. | Martina Heßler (Darmstadt): Nur ein Bug? Zur Geschichte von Softwarefehlern und neuen Formen des Nichtwissens | Info
• 04.12. | Roland Meyer (Zürich): Patterns of Pastness. Generative AI and the Re-Imagination of History | postponed

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Robert Seyfert (Kiel University) | Website

INFORMATION

Several attempts have been made in recent years towards theorising digital transformations. These approaches are concerned with examining the digital transformation in society as a whole or in its social domains, e.g., the infrastructure, the economy, the financial market, forms of subjectification and everyday life. In the following, I propose a theory of algorithmic sociality (TaS) following on from and in continuation of existing conceptual approaches. This theory aims to (1) conceptualise new (post-)social relations that have emerged in the process of digital transformation and add them to other types of social relations prevalent in sociology, such as intersubjective and interobjective relations. In doing so, digitalisation will not be understood as a unifying (or perhaps even simplifying) movement, but (2) as a process in which both the forms of relationships and the individuals in these relationships become more diverse and heterogeneous. (3) The individuals or elements (human subjects, algorithmic objects, etc.) that play a role in these relations and processes are typologically mapped. Gilbert Simondon’s concept of disparity (disparation) is used to conceptualise the relations and processes between the individuals and such elements. The notion of algorithmic sociality is proposed to describe these new (post-)social relations.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 06.06.2025

Time:

10.15 – 11.15

Place:

MSA 4.340

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m15ce01d514fcd6c2835635996636c20b

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Helle Nystad (Oslo University) | Website

INFORMATION

This PhD project investigates the use of non-standard linguistic features in adolescents' digital social writing. It explores the normative processes that shape these practices, offering empirical insight into how young people in Norway navigate written language in chat-based communication. The project forms part of the larger MultiLit project – Multilectal Literacy in Education – funded by the Norwegian Research Council. The study is based on a corpus of approximately 4,000 donated chat messages from 266 participants, supplemented by data from 16 focus group interviews. This talk highlights key findings and ongoing analyses, discussing the dynamic linguistic practices and the evolving normativity in adolescents’ digital social writing.

From April to July 2025, Helle is a visiting PhD researcher at the CuCo Lab.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 16.05.2025

Time:

10.15 – 11.15

Place:

MSA 4.340

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=mbb26026e46cd5d6f4d09eba33566d953

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Jannis Androutsopoulos (Hamburg University) | Website

INFORMATION

In sociolinguistics and beyond, the concept of the 'online-offline nexus' (OON) emerged in the last few years as a key analytical tool for grasping the interplay of digital and physical communication and interaction. While the idea that on- and offline domains of (inter)action are intertwined has been around for some time, it remains inconsistently applied. Drawing on a meta-analysis of academic publications (Androutsopoulos, forthcoming), this paper critically examines the concept's genealogy throughout the early 21st century and its use across fields such as media and communication studies (de Souza e Silva et al. 2025), pragmatics (Blitvich 2022), sociolinguistics (Blommaert 2019, Spotti 2022), sociology (Hsiao et al. 2023), multimodal interaction analysis (Avgustis 2023), and linguistic landscape research (Androutsopoulos 2024). On this basis, the paper defines OON as a multi-scalar process that operates across different scales of action and sites of social practice, including interpersonal communication, place-making, and identity construction. More specifically, the paper proposes to distinguish three primary types of OON, each characterized by specific temporal, participatory, and scalar properties: (1) simultaneous nexus action, where digital and physical activities occur concurrently, such as using navigation apps while moving through urban spaces or being co-present in an online game while sitting next to each other; (2) consecutive nexus action, where on- and offline interactions follow one another in a structured sequence and jointly contribute to accomplishing a higher level target, as when people digitally coordinate in-person meetings or transition from social media interactions to real-life encounters; (3) memetic nexus processes, where widely-circulating digital content influences offline behavior across a population, exemplified by viral trends and algorithmically mediated discourse. This typology aims to provide a more granular understanding of how OON contributes to shaping communicative practices across different contexts in post-digital societies.

References

• Androutsopoulos, J. (2024) 'The Offline-Online Nexus', in R. Blackwood et al. (eds.) The Bloomsbury Handbook of Linguistic Landscapes. London: Bloomsbury, pp. 441-455.
• Androutsopoulos, J. (forthcoming) Online-offline nexus: genealogies and trajectories, scales and sites. In: A. Georgakopoulou and T. Spilioti (eds.), The Routledge handbook of language and digital communication, 2nd edition. London: Routledge.
• Avgustis, I. (2023) 'Respecifying Phubbing: Video-Based Analysis of Smartphone Use in Co-Present Interactions', in Proceedings of the 2023 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Article 651, pp. 1-15.
• Blitvich, P. (2022) 'Karen: Stigmatized Social Identity and Face-Threat in the On/Offline Nexus', Journal of Pragmatics, 188: 14-30.
• Blommaert, J. (2019) 'Sociolinguistic Restratification in the Online-Offline Nexus: Trump's Viral Errors', Tilburg Papers in Culture Studies, 234.
• de Souza e Silva, A., Campbell, S.W. and Ling, R. (2025) 'Hybrid Space Revisited: From Concept Toward Theory', Communication Theory, 35: 14-24.
• Hsiao, Y., Leverso, J. and Papachristos, A. V. (2023) 'The Corner, the Crew, and the Digital Street: Multiplex Networks of Gang Online-Offline Conflict Dynamics in the Digital Age', American Sociological Review, 88(4): 709-741.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 25.04.2025

Time:

10.15 – 11.15

Place:

-- online only --

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m535a50661d622d61707b75af6480aa46

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Rebekah Larsen (MIT) | Website

INFORMATION

Talk radio in the US has been an enduring player in the media landscape for decades. It tends to be highly partisan (largely conservative) and rife with varieties of misinformation; it is often framed as alternative 'infotainment' on a dying (i.e., not digital) medium. There is thus a comparative dearth of research into talk radio in contemporary media studies and adjacent fields. Yet conservative talk radio—and the stations that carry it—can play outsize sociopolitical and even quasi-journalistic roles today, particularly in rural contexts. I substantiate these arguments via a mixed method, ongoing project focused on several rural talk radio stations in the US. These stations are based in a region with a high density of broadcast media and majority conservative population. In this presentation, I describe how these stations contextualize and normalize topics for their distinct audiences, produce local news as hybrid digital-broadcast actors, and facilitate local and national politics. I will also touch on methodological challenges, including on-the-ground ethnography in partisan environments, as well as capturing and archiving radio data at scale. I end with a brief discussion of why a better understanding of talk radio—and conservative media more generally—is also invaluable to current policy interventions, e.g., to mitigate news desertification.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 21.02.2025

Time:

10.15 – 11.15

Place:

Campus Belval MSA 4.340

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=md6786f049891944f9bb6616163af2fac

Program for the first semester 2025

Here is the list of upcoming talks in our Friday talk series CuCo Lab Conversations. All talks take place between 10.15 and 11.15am, both on campus Belval and via Webex.

• 21.02. | Rebekah Larsen (Copenhagen): Local Airwaves, National Impact: Conservative, rural talk radio in the US—and why we need to study it | Info
• 21.03. | Raphaël Kies (Luxembourg): -- canceled --
• 25.04. | Jannis Androutsopoulos (Hamburg): Exploring the online-offline nexus: meaning-making at the interfaces of physical and virtual (inter)action | Info
• 16.05. | Helle Nystad (Oslo): Linguistic Norms in Digital Social Writing Among Adolescents: Findings and Questions from an Ongoing PhD Project in Norway | Info
• 06.06. | Robert Seyfert (Kiel): A Theory of Algorithmic Sociality (TAS) | Info

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Dr. Ruth Reicher (Uni.lu) | Website

INFORMATION

Dass sich der junge "lîf van smerzen bôch" (aus Bruder Hermanns Yolanda von Vianden), ist nicht nur in Narrativen vormoderner Texte präsent, sondern wird vermutlich produktiv in Darstellungen moderner, einflussreicher 'Erzählungen' reproduziert. Der Beitrag unternimmt den Versuch, vormoderne Körperinszenierung als verheißungsvoll, mithin Medien der Kommunikation zu interpretieren, indem untersucht wird, inwiefern sich extreme Selbstdarstellungen als narrative Schablonen in einer Auswahl von mittelhochdeutschen Texten etablieren und wie diese möglicherweise produktiv in die dargestellte Selbstinszenierung nachfolgender Epochen (exemplarisch) übertragen und transformiert werden. Extreme der Körperinszenierung sind dabei gleichermaßen destruktiv wie konstitutiv: Durch selbstzerstörerische Körperpraktiken wird prozesshaft ein Ideal geschaffen, das im und am Körper der Protagonistinnen externalisiert und sichtbar wird. Der Körper wird so zur Projektionsfläche eines kulturell codierten Ideals, das nicht nur in mittelalterlichen Texten vermittelt wird, sondern vermutlich auch in modernen Narrativen resoniert.

Wie vormoderne literarische Körperinszenierungen Formen von Präsenz, Selbstüberhöhung und Entgrenzung als zeitübergreifende Mechanismen wirksam werden lassen und diese bis in aktuelle Strategien der Selbstdarstellung – etwa in den Narrativen erfolgreicher Influencer – hineinwirken, bildet die zentrale Fragestellung des Beitrages.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 13.12.2024

Time:

10.15 – 11.15

Place:

Campus Belval MSA 4.180

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=mba3cf551f2b89a4887e8c23dab6ca843

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Léonie de Jonge (Groningen University) | Website

INFORMATION

The far right has emerged as a significant force in global politics, gaining momentum and support in the streets and institutions worldwide. Once relegated to the fringes, far-right ideologies have increasingly been incorporated into mainstream political discourse, thereby contributing to their normalisation. As a result, the issues at the core of their ideology are no longer exclusively owned by far-right actors; indeed, nativism, authoritarianism and populism now feature in the discourses of 'mainstream' politicians. Historically, the far right was often portrayed as a mono-thematic movement that focused exclusively on immigration. However, a key characteristic of the latest wave of far-right parties and movements is their development of coherent policy agendas that extend beyond immigration to include a wide range of issues, such as security, foreign policy, environmental issues, and even food policy, where discussions around agricultural practices have raised alarms about the consumption of insects. Drawing on examples from across the European continent, this talk will explore the defining characteristics of the contemporary far right, examining how these ideologies manifest in today’s political landscape. The main argument is that while the expressions of far-right ideologies may have evolved, their underlying ideas and principles remain fundamentally unchanged. By tracing this trajectory and decoding its manifestations, we can better understand the implications for both political engagement and societal discourse in the 21st century.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 22.11.2024

Time:

10.15 – 11.15

Place:

Campus Belval MSA 4.180

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=me9a6046f5abb780496dafd8fea59e973

CuCo Lab Conversations | Dong Nguyen (Utrecht University)

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Dong Nguyen (Utrecht University) | Website

INFORMATION

In this talk, I will explore the potential synergies between large language models (LLMs) and sociolinguistics. I will explore how LLMs can enhance sociolinguistic research and, conversely, how sociolinguistic insights can inform and improve the development of LLMs.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 25.10.2024

Time:

10.15 – 11.15

Place:

Campus Belval MSA 4.180

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m1970260c78bdd99525ccfe8c7ebdac71

Informationen zum Ablauf

Am 14. und 15. Oktober 2024 findet an der Universität Luxemburg der Workshop "Mensch Metapher Maschine. Das Selbst im Spiegel der Technik | Die Technik im Spiegel des Selbst" statt. Nachfolgend finden Sie Informationen zum Programm und Ablauf des Workshops. Der thematische Rahmen des Workshops ist hier abrufbar.

Bitte beachten Sie, dass für die Teilnahme eine Anmeldung erforderlich ist. Die Teilnahme als externer Zuhörer ist auf Anfrage möglich – abhängig von verfügbaren Plätzen.

Programm

Der Workshop findet auf dem Campus Belval der Universität Luxemburg statt, im Raum MSA 3.160 des Hörsaalgebäudes (Maison du Savoir). Für angemeldete Teilnehmer werden in den Pausen Essen und Getränke bereitgestellt.

Montag, 14.10.2024

Dienstag, 15.10.2024

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Dr. Elinor Carmi (City, University of London) | Website

INFORMATION

This talk will discuss how citizens can resist, negotiate and mobilize against Big-Tech companies in a datafied society. In this project, we asked digital rights practitioners what was their experience in working with people to change the power asymmetries with Big-Tech companies. Asking digital rights practitioners what can people do to negotiate, object and oppose Big-Tech companies, four themes emerged: 1. contextual awareness; 2. real or imagined concerns; 3. who is responsible for creating and solving problems; and 4. resistance possibilities. Following from these findings we identified five possible routes that can enhance citizens' data citizenship.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 20.09.2024

Time:

10.15 – 11.15

Place:

Campus Belval MSA 4.180

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=mcd97b93b8ac268e1c71db104e0c2b26e

Program for the second semester 2024

Here is the list of upcoming talks in our Friday talk series CuCo Lab Conversations. All talks take place between 10.15 and 11.15am, both on campus and via Webex.

• 20.09. | Elinor Carmi (London): How to resist in the datafied society? | Info
• 25.10. | Dong Nguyen (Utrecht): Collaborative Growth: When Large Language Models Meet Sociolinguistics | Info
• 22.11. | Leonie de Jonge (Groningen): From Immigration to Insects: The Evolution of Far-Right Ideologies and Actors in the 21st Century | Info
• 13.12. | Ruth Reicher (Luxembourg): Der weibliche Körper als Kommunikationsmedium: Perspektiven auf und Parallelen zwischen Beispielen der mittelhochdeutschen Literatur und social media | Info to follow

Das Selbst im Spiegel der Technik | Die Technik im Spiegel des Selbst

Internationaler Workshop an der Universität Luxemburg, 14. und 15. Oktober 2024

Organisation: Christoph Purschke (Luxemburg), Ralf Becker (Landau), Simon Kasper (Düsseldorf)

Teilnahme mit Vortrag auf Einladung

Das Programm des Workshops kann hier eingesehen werden: Programm.

Thematischer Rahmen

Die Tagung thematisiert die wechselseitig aufeinander bezogenen Prozesse der Technomorphisierung des Menschen und der Anthopomorphisierung der Technik.

Urheber dieser Gestaltungen ist jeweils der Mensch selbst. Wir sind bekanntlich das Lebewesen, das sich ein Bild von sich selbst macht oder machen kann. Unter welchen historischen, sozialen und technischen Bedingungen Menschen dies tatsächlich tun, ist eine offene, empirische Frage. Außer Frage steht jedoch, dass menschliche Selbstbilder, wo sie zum Ausdruck kommen, so wandelbar sind wie die Bedingungen, unter denen der Mensch lebt. Der Mensch, der sich fragt, was er sei, stellt diese Frage im Bewusstsein seines eigenen Abgesetztseins von etwas, dem er sich gegenüber sieht, das nicht er ist und in Auseinandersetzung mit dem er sein Selbst bildet. Die Gottebenbildlichkeit des Menschen im Alten Testament ist dafür ein Beispiel unter vielen.

Der vielleicht bedeutendste jüngere Typus eines Gegenübers, der den neuzeitlichen Menschen für die Selbstbildung herausfordert, ist die Technik. Der neuzeitliche Mensch formt sein Selbstbild am Modell der jeweils das öffentliche Leben, den öffentlichen Diskurs und die wirtschaftlichen Produktionsbedingungen dominierenden technischen Innovationen. So begriff sich der frühneuzeitliche Mensch, zumindest in seinen materiellen Anteilen, als Maschine und imaginierte seine organismischen Funktionen am Modell der zeitgenössischen mechanischen Geräte, durch deren Rohre Flüssigkeiten gepumpt werden und deren Gelenke sich durch Kronradgetriebe bewegen. Später kam der Dampf hinzu. Spätestens mit der Ankunft des Computers in privaten Haushalten haben viele von uns sich selbst gut cartesianisch als Hardware (res extensa) konzipiert, auf der Softwares (res cogitans) laufen. Dass 'Informationen im Gehirn gespeichert' werden, ist fester Bestandteil des Sprachgebrauchs von vielen, und dass Bewusstseinsinhalte demnächst in die Cloud hochgeladen werden, scheint vielen möglich. Jüngst werden wir durch die sog. generativen künstlichen Intelligenzen derart herausgefordert, dass wir uns fragen, ob unsere eigenen Fähigkeiten der Hervorbringung von Sprache und anderen symbolischen Formen nicht selbst auf probabilistischen Operationen beruhen. Vor diesem Hintergrund lässt sich eine Tendenz zur Technomorphisierung des menschlichen Selbstbilds durch den Menschen selbst konstatieren. Im aktuellen Hype um KI und ihre ökonomische Valorisierung geht damit eine (symbolische wie praktische) Abwertung originär menschlicher Leistungen gegenüber technisch vermittelten einher.

Die Diagnose der Technomorphisierung menschlicher Selbstbilder bleibt also unvollständig ohne den korrelativen Prozess der Anthropomorphisierung der Technik. Ein kurzer Blick auf aktuelle Sprachgebräuche ergibt, dass Computer als Kombinationen aus Hardware und Software 'rechnen', Korrekturen 'vorschlagen', Menschen an Termine 'erinnern' und sich 'weigern', Befehle auszuführen; und wenn man Berichten in Presse und Wissenschaft glaubt, dann 'sprechen', 'denken', 'antworten', 'erkennen', 'beraten', 'lügen' und 'halluzinieren' die sog. generativen künstlichen Intelligenzen sogar, und sie tun anscheinend noch vieles mehr, was auch Menschen tun.

Mögliche Leitfragen für Beiträge

Die Tagung thematisiert disziplinär offen solche Fragen, die mit den Prozessen der Technomorphisierung des Menschen und/oder der Anthropomorphisierung der Technik befasst sind. Beispielhaft können dies sein:

• Welche sind die historischen, sozialen, kognitiven, technikbezogenen Bedingungen, unter denen Menschen ihr Bild von sich als Menschen technomorphisieren und unter denen Menschen die Technik als Technik anthropomorphisieren?
• Haben die Quelldomänen, aus denen Menschen schöpfen, um sich ein Bild von sich selbst zu machen, und die Zieldomänen ihrer Anthropomorphisierung eine historische Richtung, ein Telos, folgen sie einem bestimmten Pfad?
• Handelt es sich bei der Technomorphisierung des menschlichen Selbstbildes und der Anthropomorphisierung der Technik um ein dialektisches Verhältnis? Verlaufen sie synchron? Haben sie verschiedene Tempi? Erfolgen sie zeitlich gestaffelt?
• Welche sind die Medien der Techno-/Anthropomorphisierung? Sind diese Prozesse „bloß“ sprachliche oder anderweitig symbolisch vermittelte Metaphern und Vergleiche oder sind ihre symbolischen Vermittlungen auch Ausdruck kognitiver oder affektiver Ähnlichkeits- oder Identitätsannahmen bzw. -wahrnehmungen?
• Wenn keine Identität zwischen dem historisch (jeweiligen) Menschen und der historisch (jeweiligen) Technik angenommen wird, was sind die Kriterien dafür, bestimmte Merkmale und Eigenschaften vom einen auf das andere zu projizieren und bestimmte andere nicht? Werden dabei „hinter“ den Menschenbildern umfassendere metaphysische Sinnsysteme erkennbar?
• Werden, je ähnlicher technische Artefakte (nach bestimmten Kriterien) in ihren Leistungen menschlichen Leistungen werden, auch die Techno-/Anthropomorphisierungen umso vollständiger, restloser, bis hin zur Identifikation? Ist der Begriff des Menschen damit in Auflösung begriffen? Diffundiert der Gegenstand der Anthropologie in den Gegenstandsbereich anderer Disziplinen, und wenn ja, welcher?
• Welche ethischen Fragen sind mit den Prozessen der Techno-/Anthropomorphisierung verbunden, im Allgemeinen und in Bezug auf spezifische historische Konstellationen wie die aktuellen?
• Gibt es normative Ansätze zur Kritik der Techno-/Anthropomorphisierung in ethischer, philosophischer, wissenschaftlicher, theologischer, sprachlicher Hinsicht und wie ist sie jeweils begründet?

Co-hosted event with C2DH & Institute of Romance Studies, Media and Arts

SPEAKER

• Dr. Alban Leveau-Vallier (University Paris 8 & Sciences Po Paris) | Website

INFORMATION

In his proposal for the Dartmouth summer research project (1955-1956), Nathaniel Rochester wondered whether injecting some randomness into a machine could make it creative. But how to control this randomness to prevent machines crashing and ensure the generated content’s relevance ? Seventy years later, the so-called « generative AI » seems to have solved the problem, or at least circumvented some obstacles. Despite the difficulty of estimating what goes on inside deep neural networks, we will briefly describe what « creativity » is about in generative AIs (interpolation in a latent space) and the current controversy over how to evaluate it using dedicated benchmarks. Then, drawing from literature and philosophy (Borges, Caillois, Bachelard), we will challenge the claim that it can be compared to human creativity. Finally, we will examine how these machines don’t have to be creative like humans to trigger an epochal change that we need to characterize.

Alban Leveau-Vallier is a postdoctoral researcher at University Paris 8 and lecturer at Sciences Po Paris. He recently published IA, l’intuition et la création à l’épreuve des algorithmes (Champ Vallon).

COORDINATES

Date:

Wednesday, 12.06.2024

Time:

15.15 – 16.45

Place:

Campus Belval, MSH Black Box

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m21ffa2b3da064fc38d66089d0ec631a8

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Greta Jasser (University of Göttingen) | Website

INFORMATION

'Let's play extremism' is an exploratory research project examining the remediation of gaming videos on YouTube and other video streaming platforms, produced and shared by far-right accounts. The investigation aims to shed new light on how video games co-opted by far-right political actors are received, potentially contributing toward greater mainstream engagement with 'far-right' – supremacist and exclusivist – political ideals. It also attends to the nexus of YouTube's commercial imperatives and the platform's facility for disseminating far-right content.

Co-authored with Imogen Richards (Deakin University), Briar Dickey (Vrije Universiteit Brussel), Sam Smith

NOTE: This talk will also be part of the Focus Europe Events in the Bachelor en Cultures Européennes at the FHSE and begin with a thematic introduction by Catherine Tebaldi & Alistair Plum.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 03.05.2024

Time:

11.00 – 12.30

Place:

Campus Belval MSA 3.330

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m935844bc94f4c814187368672b4c7410

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Dr. Mi-Cha Flubacher (ZHAW) | Website

INFORMATION

It might have become somewhat of a cliché to invoke Dell Hymes, one the of the founding figures of sociolinguistics (e.g. 1973, 1996), to argue for the study of inequality between speakers and language(s) as the main concern for the newly emerging discipline. How does sociolinguistics deal with social inequality today? While inequalities are recognised to be deeply entrenched in social structures, sociolinguists sometimes wonder what they can offer in the face of on-going wars, existential crises, and potentially life-threatening experiences of minoritized groups. Is it facetious to study inequality related to speakers and language(s) – or is it even more relevant than ever? It is the aim of this talk to make a case for the study of inequality in and through language. For this purpose, I will discuss the example of language learning for professional purposes in the context of migrant integration.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 19.04.2024

Time:

11.30 – 12.30

Place:

Campus Belval, MSA 3.220

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m1d2ea6138a84205d2b8043ef2e2d0b93

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Dr. Elisabeth Barakos (University of Vienna) | Website

INFORMATION

Intensified transnational population flows, changing socio-political and geopolitical constellations and economic systems have shifted perceptions from seeing multilingualism as a problem to treating it as a resource which provides added value and serves as a marker of distinction. However, not all people are multilingual for the same reasons, and not all types of multilingualism are equal in treatment and perception. Rather, multilingualism and attendant linguistic varieties used are an object of aspiration and prestige for some, whilst creating vulnerability and injustices in access to education or the job market for others. Multilingualism is thus marked by classed and racialised hierarchies.

In this paper, I take up the concept of elite multilingualism as a space to talk about eliteness and the formation of positions of (linguistic) privilege, distinction and power in an age of social division and inequality. I will first provide a historical sketch of 'elites’, 'eliteness’ and 'elite multilingualism' by reviewing how different scholars have talked about these phenomena in different contexts and points in time, using different discursive labels. I will then connect these phenomena to standard language ideology, accentism and the figure of the native speaker – perennial sociolinguistic and applied linguistic issues that haven’t loosened their grip. To exemplify, selected studies are presented that offer an understanding of various elite sites, elite meaning-making practices and current elitist understandings of who counts as a legitimate speaker. I will conclude by engaging with how elite studies can connect more meaningfully to the study of language and social class, and in what forms different types of elite multilingualism may feature in the creation of class and racial distinction.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 22.03.2024

Time:

11.30 – 12.30

Place:

Campus Belval, MSA 3.230

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m63c934f64f9658dc29c81cce632154ad

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Nathalie Roelens (DHUM)

INFORMATION

L'expression « reality challenged person », prononcée par la lycéenne rebelle dans le film Barbie de Greta Gerwig (2023), escorte une réflexion sur ChatGPT comme moteur de recherche « en carence de réalité », sur ses biais et ses travers. Dans un premier temps, nous montrerons que l'outil souffre à la fois de psittacisme (répétition mécanique de phrases) et d'une ambition démesurée, avide de concurrencer la « Providence ». La Barbie transhumaine n'est que l'avatar du « trasumanar » de la Béatrice de Dante dont le discours au premier chant du Paradis est empreint de théologie scolastique. En arguant que « Sapientia judicat et ordinat de omnibus », Thomas d'Aquin n'a-t-il pas fait de Dieu un grand odonnateur / ordinateur ? L'aplomb et l'assertivité des réponses du robot conversationnel ponctuées de « voici » rappellent le « Hoc est enim corpus meum » christique, l'incarnation en moins toutefois. Un second volet sera consacré à l'inversion entre paradigme et syntagme, déjà annoncée en 1998 par Lev Manovitch, abolissant la « fonction poétique » de Jakobson et dès lors l'extravagance, l'humour, l'imprévisible, mais aussi paradoxalement le réel. L'image factice générée par l'IA sera enfin confrontée à l'image-malice que Didi-Huberman a théorisée dans le sillage de trois historiens hétérodoxes, Warburg, Benjamin et Carl Einstein, et qui échappe, par son anachronisme et sa singularité, à tout embrigadement numérique.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 01.03.2024

Time:

11.30 – 12.30

Place:

Campus Belval, MSA room 3.160

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m6401f5567c6895529e605d3d1092a41d

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Prof. Dr. Gabriel Menotti (Queen's University, Ontario) | Website

INFORMATION

In this session, Prof. Gabriel Menotti from Queen’s University, Ontario, Canada will delve into the topic of computational cinemas. Today, all cinema is computational to some extent. Computer systems have been integrated into media apparatus from cameras to screens, subjecting the circulation of images to continuous algorithmic management. The software processes that underlie everyday media operations not only inform how movies are made, but also condition their distribution and even prescribe how they should behave on our devices. Pervasive and hyperactive, these technologies expand on the possibilities of cinematographic work and deeply reconfigure what this work entails. In doing so, they urge us to question what kinds of cinema are being done, how, and by whom – or what.

This talk delves into this subject by exploring two emerging paradigms of computation-based moviemaking: one rooted in 3D simulation and the physics of optical media, another reliant on the direct synthesis of sound and image by neural networks. We’ll see how each of these approaches – let’s call them “virtual production” and “generative AI” – roughly correspond to opposing traditions of technical imaging, respectively hegemonic and avant-garde. Each in their own ways, both 3D simulation and neural networks enable moviemakers to more fully incorporate strategies particular to software development into their pipelines, automate workflows and, overall, expand the cinematographic craft in an unprecedented fashion. But these technologies are not without their controversies. While empowering indie producers and major studios alike, they have been implicated in the growing precarization of labor, the expropriation of personal data, and the homogenization of cultural expressions. How can we address these ethical issues while embracing the transformative potential of new technologies to cinema? Is it even possible?

In search of answers, we’ll attempt to reach beyond the conventions of modern media and consider forms of audiovisual expression incidental to the circumstances of networked computation, such as screensavers, videogame cutscenes, and streaming performances.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 19.01.2024

Time:

11.30 – 12.30

Place:

Campus Belval, MSA room 2.390

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=mcb954c0e7702c822801ec75a9bd12744

Program for the first semester 2024

Here is the list of upcoming talks in our Friday talk series CuCo Lab Conversations.

• 19.01. | Gabriel Menotti: Computational cinemas: two tentative paradigms and some incidents | Info
• 01.03. | Nathalie Roelens: Barbie, Béatrice et le robot conversationnel GPT | Info
• 22.03. | Elisabeth Barakos: Elite Multilingualism: an exploration of linguistic privilege and distinction | Info
• 19.04. | Mi-Cha Flubacher: Language and social inequality: A framework for sociolinguistic research | Info
• 03.05. | Greta Jasser: Let's play extremism. Mainstreaming of far-right political ideas through 'let's play' gaming videos | Info

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Dr. Maria Kunilovskaya (Uni Saarland), postdoctoral researcher

INFORMATION

Translated texts are known to exhibit translationese properties that make them distinct from comparable non-translations in the target language along a number of linguistic parameters. As a result, translations can be more difficult to understand for the target audiences, incurring additional processing costs. The difference between translations and non-translations is known to have an effect on the evaluation of machine translation engines. Translations might misrepresent the target language in contrastive studies. This project applies Large Language Model (LLM) prompting, an emerging NLP method exploiting the capacities of generative AI to solve linguistic problems, to the task of debiasing translationese. We use a set of linguistically motivated translationese indicators in a series of prompt design experiments to arrive at a translation variant that is less translated than the input target text. In effect, LLM is prompted to post-edit an existing human translation segment-by-segment following an instruction customised to each individual input segment. The task of debiasing translationese (detecting and eradicating the translationese features) can be useful for producing a more homogeneous output in the target language that exhibits less deviations from the expected target language norm.

This study contributes to the growing bulk of work that demonstrates the benefits of using LLM for text adaptation such as simplification, style transfer, or translation (post-)editing.

The prompt-design part of this project explores human-machine interaction options, rising to the challenge of combining the explanatory power of knowledge-rich features rooted in contrastive analysis and translation theory with the computational capabilities of modern language models. The experiments are based on a bidirectional German-English sample from the parallel Europarl data.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 01.12.2023

Time:

11.30 – 12.30

Place:

Campus Belval, MSA room 4.520

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m08a287545de62c4904ac8e3dddcd39ff

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKERs

• Dr. Catherine Tebaldi (DHUM), postdoctoral researcher at CuCo Lab
• Dr. Alistair Plum (DHUM), postdoctoral researcher at CuCo Lab

INFORMATION

In this installment of the CuCo Lab Conversations Catherine Tebaldi and Alistair Plum will speak about their co-authored paper Granola Nazis and Hyperborean Heroes, which looked at the intersections of far-right, health, and masculinity development discourses in Instagram using a variety of quantitative and qualitative tools from semiotics to sentiment analysis. Their analysis showed how far-right users took up language from wellness and personality development to make fascism into a kind of self-project. This talk will present both some of their research findings, and then reflect on the joys and challenges of mixed-methods research in the humanities and in particular, their new critical-mixed methods approach.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 20.10.2023

Time:

11.00 – 12.00

Place:

Campus Belval, MSA room 2.230

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m5cb412b2929568a43c70d48a3d29466a

Internationaler Workshop in der Villa Vigoni, 29.11–02.12.2023

Gemeinsam mit den Kollegen Harry Lehmann und Till Dembeck vom Institut für Germanistik richtet das CuCo Lab, vertreten durch Christoph Purschke, einen internationalen Workshop in der Villa Vigoni aus. Vom 29.11. bis zum 02.12. 2023 trifft sich eine gemsichte Gruppe aus Teilnehmer:innen aus dem Department for Humanities mit rennomierten internationalen Gästen, um die Unwägbarkeiten der digitalen Transformation zu diskutieren. Im Zentrum des Interesse steht dabei "Das Andere der Zählbarkeit", also all jene Bereiche von Kultur, die sich nur schwer (oder gar nicht verlustfrei) quantisieren oder digitalisieren lassen. Zu den eingeladenen Gästen gehören unter anderem Simon Kasper (Düsseldorf), Sybille Krämer (Berlin), Dieter Mersch (Zürich) und Ralf Becker (Landau).

Das Andere der Zählbarkeit: Sprache – Kultur – Praxis

Die Operation des (Ab-)Zählens ist so alltäglich und zugleich von so weitreichender Konsequenz für unsere Vorstellung von Wissen, dass es auf Anhieb schwerfällt zu sagen, was das 'Andere' der Zählbarkeit überhaupt sein könnte, wobei im Alltagsverständnis von Zählbarkeit in aller Regel Ganzzahligkeit unterstellt wird – bzw. heute in einem erweiterten Sinne: Digitalität. Zwar lassen sich leicht Beispiele finden, die im Alltag entweder keiner Zählung bedürfen (z.B. Atemluft) oder von denen man erwartet, dass sie sich einer Quantifizierung weitgehend entziehen (z.B. Gefühle). Auch diese lassen sich jedoch in zählbare Einheiten überführen (Zählen von Atemzügen in der Mediation; diagnostische Messung des Lungenvolumens; Happiness Index), wobei sich dann aber die Frage stellt, inwiefern sie dabei ihren Charakter verändern bzw. in welches Verhältnis zählbare und 'andere' Aspekte ihrer phänomenalen Gestalt eintreten.

Damit angesprochen sind die Abgrenzbarkeit von 'Einheiten' aus einer Gesamtheit (z.B. Einzellauten in einer Stimmäußerung), ihre Übertragbarkeit in diskreten, verlustfrei reproduzierbaren Zeichen (z.B. die Repräsentation von Information in Binärcode), aber auch Artefakte und Übertragungsverluste von Digitalisierungsprozessen (z.B. Quantisierungsrauschen und Kompression bei Audiosignalen). Somit lassen sich mehrere Perspektiven auf das Andere der Zählbarkeit werfen: Es kann hier um Phänomene gehen, die sich der Digitalisierung entziehen – weil sie grundsätzlich nicht mit diskreten Zeichensätzen zu erfassen und (ab)zählbar sind. Weiter inte-ressieren Denkfiguren, die Zweiwertigkeit – im Sinne einer Unterscheidung von 'Einem' gegenüber einem 'Anderen' – prinzipiell in Zweifel ziehen, also jenseits klarer Abgrenzungen und diskreter Kategorien operieren wollen. Daneben sind hiermit aber auch Verfahren aufgerufen, die (Er)Zählbarkeit in Form von Kategorien, Taxonomien oder Theorien methodisch herstellen – sei es als Teil der Alltags-praxis oder zu Zwecken der wissenschaftlichen Erfassung.

Der Workshop zum "Anderen der Zählbarkeit" möchte unterschiedliche Disziplinen miteinander ins Gespräch bringen, um Möglichkeiten eines Denkens diesseits wie jenseits von Digitalität und Zweiwertigkeit auszuloten. Dazu gehört, die gesellschaftliche und wissenschaftspolitische Relevanz von Geistes- und Kulturwissenschaften angesichts eines starken Digitalisierungsdrucks herauszuarbeiten. Ebenso im Fokus stehen formale Zugänge zu Zählbarkeit als kulturellem Ordnungsmuster, etwa die Wissensgeschichte der Ganzzahligkeit oder die theoretisch-methodische Absicherung von Disziplinen über Regime der (Ab)Zählbarkeit. Dabei sollen auch Motive für die umfassende Digitalisierung von Lebenswelten hinterfragt werden, ebenso wie Positionen von Digitalisierungskritik. Nicht zuletzt, weil Zählbarkeit zu den Konstituenzien der Moderne gehört und mit ihr auch große Zukunftsversprechen verbunden wurden (und werden), sind mathematisch inspirierte Gesellschaftsutopien entstanden. So verbindet sich mit der Digitalisierung etwa das Versprechen einer vollständigen Verdatung der Welt, die konzeptuelle Reprä-sentation mittelfristig durch rein statistische Korrelation ersetzt – ein epistemologischer Anspruch, welcher der Suche nach Refugien der Unzählbarkeit politische Dringlichkeit verleiht. Lassen sich das Absolut-Setzen von Zählbarkeit (etwa in den 'hard sciences') ebenso wie die verbreitete Ablehnung derselben (etwa in den Geisteswissenschaften) auch als eine (in)direkte Reaktion auf solche Technikutopien verstehen? Und inwiefern beeinflussen diese gegenläufigen Positionen den öffentlichen Diskurs über Nutzen und Gefahren der Digitalisierung?

Der Workshop 2023 ist unter dem Schlagwort "Sprache" einem Fragenspektrum gewidmet, das neben sprachlichen und linguistischen auch analog zu Sprache beschreibbare Ausdrucksformen einschließen soll. Gegenstand der Betrachtung sind also sowohl die sogenannten 'natürlichen' Sprachen als auch Programmiersprachen, die Mathematik und die Künste.

Edited volume on "That’s cultural Marxism: Critical Approaches to Conspiracy Narratives"

QAnon devotees “baking” their "breadcrumbs" or assembling stories from cryptic posts, while farmers’ markets sell heirloom tomatoes and reactionary conspiracies about the great reset. It seems conspiracy narratives in a variety of places from the very expected tinfoil hat corners of the internet, to the unexpected like yoga studios or reddit’s GameStop stock exchange forums. The narratives themselves, weave together highly typical elements – corrupt elites, heroic truth seekers – and the strange and aleatory.. Conspiracy narratives sit between play and revelation, creating truth from the margins or playing with its borders, they sit between critique and reaction, encoding social commentary and the language of the little guy but often with the effect of bolstering power.

We ask in this volume: What kinds of conspiracy theories are told, why these, and what do they do?

Content

Conspiracy theories may do bad things, but they are good stories. In this volume we seek more work on the narratives, the language, or the stories of conspiracy. We seek pieces that explore how they are created, repeated, reiterated or transformed, and what kinds of characters populate them. We also welcome pieces which can address why do they appear at some times and not others, or why some elements are easily taken up into conspiracy and not others. We are particularly eager for work which addresses both the narrative elements of conspiracy and its social effects.

We encourage cross-disciplinary, collaborative, and critical scholarship on conspiracy narratives, and are particularly open to critical mixed-methods approaches and to work on areas outside the US. We begin from a sociolinguistic and discourse analytical approach but aim to include a wide range of disciplinary orientations and approaches including history, literature, cultural studies, media studies and digital humanities. These could include studies of the repetition and reiteration of a particular conspiracy across history, close readings of key conspiracy texts, semiotic analysis of conspiracy narratives, or an exploration of the popular culture elements that get taken up into a conspiracy. More broadly we seek exciting interpretivist or mixed-methods research with critical, socio-cultural, or historical approaches to conspiracy narratives.

Themes

Chapters should be between 5000 and 6000 words, though shorter papers (3000-4000) will also be welcomed.

Submissions can cover any aspect of conspiracy narratives, some examples might include

• QAnon’s or other conspiracies’ linguistic style
• The mainstreaming of Q and other conspiracy
• Conspiracy as play, popular media, affect
• Conspiracy and late capitalism
• Conspiracy and gender
• Conspiracy and Popular media

Submission

Please reach out to the lab or Catherine Tebaldi directly for any questions or further information. Please mention Conspiracy Edited Volume in the subject line.

15 August 2023:

Submit an abstract of your chapter (max. 500 words) to the lab with 'Conspiracy Abstract' in the subject line

15 September 2023:

Notification of acceptance

20 January 2024:

Submit your complete chapter

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKER

Dr. Bereket A. Yilma (FSTM) | Website

INFORMATION

With the advent of digital media, the availability of art content has greatly expanded, making it increasingly challenging for individuals to discover and curate works that align with their personal preferences and taste. The task of providing accurate and personalized Visual Art (VA) recommendations is thus a complex one, requiring a deep understanding of the intricate interplay of multiple modalities such as images, textual descriptions, or other metadata. Furthermore, it requires understanding how users interact with highly subjective content, the complexity of the concepts embedded within the artwork, and the emotional and cognitive reflections they may trigger in users. This talk, will focus on efficiently capturing the elements (i.e., latent semantic relationships) of visual art for deriving personalized recommendations. I will showcase our recent research that proposes a novel approach to design and study personalised VA Recommendations based on textual and visual feature learning techniques, as well as their combinations. I will present our findings from a small-scale and a large-scale user-centric evaluation of the quality of the recommendations highlighting how this research contributes to our understanding of delivering personalised content its implications and how it can benefit other domains where personalization has gained momentum.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 09.06.2023

Time:

11.00 – 12.00

Place:

Campus Belval, MSA room 2.230

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=mc2168dca4efdafb10e92ab9dd48d2e7d

Introducing the projects "ConMan" and "AI ideologies" at the occasion of the 'Technolinguistics' conference

From May 24-27 2023, the CuCo Lab was a guest at the conference "Technolinguistics: Socially Situating Language in AI Systems" in Siegen, Germany, which focused on questioning current developments in AI and language technology from a critical perspective. See the conference call here. In the circle of many exciting presentations from AI research, linguistics and anthropology, the Lab's team was able to present two of its projects for the first time.

ConMan: stories from a cooperative anthro-computational approach to the study of conspiracy theories

Alistair Plum and Catherine Tebaldi, with Christoph Purschke

Linguistic methods are always also ideologies, ways of understanding language and its relationship to the social world. Following on the conference theme of cooperation, members of Culture and Computation Lab – a linguistic anthropologist, and two computational linguists – offer an account of the theoretical and ideological questions which emerged in the lab’s project ConMan, an NLP resource aimed at documenting and ultimately enabling the detection of conspiracy theories which is informed by critical digital and linguistic anthropological research.

Moving beyond an understanding of language as naturally occurring and "context free” which animates much of NLP, our lab refers to critical sociolinguistic and anthropological understandings of language as a non-neutral medium that cannot be separated from the social world. As media anthropology (Gershon 2017) shows us that digital spaces are not neutral, or rule governed sites of information processing, platform affordances also shape social, affective, ideological spaces; indeed, this very idea of abstract, rules governed processes can create, hide, and legitimate relations of oppression and inequality (Noble 2018). This is especially important in the world of digital political discourse in which ConMan aims to intervene the proliferation of fascist, far-right ideology online. ConMan combines an anthropological framework and machine learning to analyze conspiracy theories. This project will build on linguistic anthropological frameworks to look at the production, circulation, and consumption of conspiracy narratives, their social and ideological effects, and design an NLP tool to identify them. Initial conversations moved from understanding the "truth” or "correctness” of these narratives to looking at their uptake and consequences. This move, we hope, also brings us beyond "fact-checking” approaches which legitimate powerful, and often exclusionary, institutional discourses and cultural studies approaches which characterize conspiracy as "popular knowledge” and elide its damaging political and social effects.

The specific case of ConMan also raises broader theoretical and methodological questions: What would it mean to have a culturally grounded, socially anchored vision of NLP? What are the interactions, cooperations, and contradictions between the social and the computational? Is it possible to have a critical computational sociolinguistics? Can this collaboration create new forms of NLP, critical machine learning? Or is a critical sociolinguistics limited to critique – to understanding, and countering the ways AI creates, erases, and legitimates inequalities?

Bibliography

• Gershon, Ilana. 2017. "Language and the Newness of Media.” Annual Review of Anthropology46 (1), 15–31. Link
• Noble, Safiya Umoja. 2018. Algorithms of Oppression. How Search Engines Reinforce Racism. New York: New York University Press. Link

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From "natural" to "culturally grounded" and "socially anchored". Examining the notion of language in NLP

Christoph Purschke, with Alistair Plum and Catherine Tebaldi

The humanities conceptualize language as an essentially social construction, a symbolic form that is deeply rooted in the history of human culture. This double determination of language (as being socially anchored and culturally grounded) informs scholarly approaches to understanding language and its fundamental importance for human activity in the world. Contrary to this, the technical discussion of language in NLP and Machine Learning is often characterized by a "natural” given of linguistic information as "data”. NLP terminology is full of culturally loaded terms, be it the "knowledge” of language models, their "understanding” of language, or the notion of "intelligence” in technical applications (Bender & Koller 2020). In addition, fundamental concepts like the term "model” itself build on a notion of language as "naturally occurring”. Among other things, this results in the description of NLP resources as models "of language” – instead of models "for language”. Considering the current hype – both in NLP and its public uptake – around Large Language Models (e.g., GPT-4, LaMDA, LLaMA) and their applications as sources of "information” (e.g., ChatGPT, Bard, Bing) in artificial communication (Esposito 2022), we will discuss the consequences of a culturally-grounded understanding of language for NLP and Machine Learning. Starting from the idea that language is a social, embodied, and highly contextually determined practice, we examine current NLP terminology to highlight some of its consequences for working with language:

A) By ascribing intrinsically cultural values to technical derivations of actual language practice, NLP neglects the manifold socio-cultural prerequisites of automatic language processing in the sense of a naturalization of the object (e.g., the relationship between human perspective and "bias” in NLP).

B) By using metaphors coined for socio-cognitive processes to describe the performance of technical artifacts NLP blurs the crucial difference between language as human practice and its technical reproduction to simulate practice (e.g., in the context of Artificial Intelligence or "sentient” language models; tiku 2022).

Bibliography

• Bender, Emily M., and Alexander Koller. 2020. Climbing towards NLU: On Meaning, Form, and Understanding in the Age of Data. In: Proceedings of the 58th Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics, 5185–98. Online: Association for Computational Linguistics. Link
• Esposito, Elena. 2022. Artificial communication. How Algorithms Produce Social Intelligence. Cambridge: The MIT Press.
• ku, Nitasha. 2022. The Google engineer who thinks the company’s AI has come to life. In: The Washington Post, 11 June 2022. Online. Link

Edited volume on "Data Science and History: Practicing and Theorizing Data-Driven Inquiries into the Past"

In the last decade historians have witnessed a proliferation of digitized and born-digital data sets. Examples include digitized correspondences, oral history interviews, photos, and maps. A growing number of cultural institutions such as archives, museums, and libraries, have made parts of their digital assets available in raw data formats. Some institutions launched pilot projects experimenting with data releases. Historical data sets encourage data-driven inquiries into the past, as well as the integration of data science methods into historical research. Best practice, and illustrative examples in the application of data science methods in historical research remain scarce, however. Similarly, the epistemological and theoretical underpinning of historical research applying data science methods needs to be developed. This collection of papers will offer a panorama of the current state of the art in the application of data science methods in historical research; it will be submitted to the Digital Humanities Quarterly (DHQ) as a special issue.

Themes

We specifically invite contributions that analyze data sets and integrate complex models of data science into historical inquiry. We also seek contributions that discuss the development of new data sets and research softwares. In brief, we aim to publish papers with three foci:

• analysis of historical data sets with data science methods
• software development for the application of data science methods in history
• preparation of historical data sets to be studied with data science methods

Content

Prospective authors are asked to reflect on know-how, best practice, and epistemology, as well as how newly developed data and software will contribute to existing knowledge and scholarship. Authors are also encouraged to include deeper methodological reflections and to highlight how data science methods can further our understanding of the past and open new directions for future research. More generally, we seek fresh and original perspectives that problematize both data and data-centric approaches, as well as the synergies between theory and practice.

Submission

We encourage contributions between 5000 and 8000 words, though shorter papers (3000 - 5000) will also be considered.

Submission timeline:

15 July 2023:

Submit an abstract of your paper (max. 500 words) through the following link: https://tinyurl.com/mr24cecv

15 August 2023:

Notification of acceptance and submission of accepted abstracts to DHQ

10 December 2023:

Submit your complete paper (submission link TBA)

We aim to publish the special issue in the summer of 2024.

For further information, please contact Gabor Mihaly Toth: gabor.toth@maximilianeum.de (please use the subject header “DHQ Special Issue”).

We are looking forward to receiving your abstract and reading your contribution.

Guest editors

• Gabor Mihaly Toth
• Caitlin Burge
• Christoph Purschke
• Marten Düring

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKERS

• Dr. Lorella Viola (C2DH) | talk
• Prof. Dr. Christoph Schommer (FSTM) | discussant

INFORMATION

The Digital Turn had promised to 'free' knowledge from subjectivity. But as the reassuring promises of objectivity and accuracy based on notions of quantitative, computational, automated, and unsupervised turned out to be illusory, is digital scholarship even more biased than the interpretative act itself? As there is no such a thing as 'neutral data' or 'objective methods', what is now the role of the digital scholar? Is Critical Digital Humanities the answer? In this talk, Viola first analyses different ways in which reality has been transformed by technology; she then argues that the digitisation of society has added levels of complexity to reality that our model of knowledge creation can no longer explain. In arguing for a new model of knowledge creation, Viola proposes a novel conceptual and methodological framework, the "post-authentic framework“ for which digital objects are living compositions that react to societies and bear consequences. Beyond our current rigid model of knowledge creation, the post-authentic framework ultimately aims to address the increasingly pressing questions: how do we create knowledge today? And how do we want the next generation of students to be trained? Viola proposes a novel way: knowledge creation in the digital.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 21.04.2023

Time:

11.00 – 12.00

Place:

Campus Belval, MSA room 2.400

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m857fd423c5e2cacc94b56c16e2548cad

CuCo Lab co-hosts the 2023 edition of the DHd conference in Trier & Belval | 13.–17.03.2023

As one of our first larger projects, we got involved in organizing the 2023 edition of the DHd conference series titled 'Open Humanities, Open Culture'. Co-hosted in Trier (Trier Center for Digital Humanities) and Belval (C2DH), we became part of the organization team to ensure the organization would run smoothly. Among other things, our very own Dr. Alistair Plum made sure that the conference book of abstracts would look just as slick and polished as our lab website. The conference was also an excellent opportunity to introduce the CuCo Lab to the German-speaking DH community as a recent addition to the digital research landscape.

The conference website is still available here: https://dhd2023.dig-hum.de

The book of abstracts can be found on Zenodo: 10.5281/zenodo.7688631

CuCo Lab Conversations talk series

SPEAKERS

• Dr. Alistair Plum
• Dr. Catherine Tebaldi
• Prof. Dr. Christoph Purschke

INFORMATION

The recent rise of a new generation of language models like ChatGPT and LaMDA has put the potential and dangers of AI at the center of public interest. Conversational agents can be used as versatile sources of information and text for many different purposes. Despite the substantial problems these applications face in terms of response accuracy and data ethics, their success brings about questions regarding the core practices of a university: research and teaching.

With this meeting, the Culture & Computation Lab offers an open space for exchange around the implications of conversational agents for research and teaching. Starting with a brief introduction to the technology behind these systems and existing policies for their use in education, we hope to engage in an open discussion with the members of the department about the chances and challenges chatbots like ChatGPT and LaMDA bring to universities and the public alike.

COORDINATES

Date:

Friday, 03.03.2023

Time:

11.00 – 12.00

Place:

Campus Belval, MSA room 4.500

Webex:

https://unilu.webex.com/unilu/j.php?MTID=m0d4f8c8ab44214d3ed869f53914705c6

In a new installment of the SciLux podcast, Christoph Purschke, head of the CuCo Lab and professor in Computational Linguistics as the Department of Humanities, talks about languages and language technology in Luxembourg. The discussion with host Hanna Siemaszko touches upon many topics related to his work at the University of Luxembourg, e.g., the ongoing standardization of Luxembourgish, the development on NLP resources for Luxembourgish as a small language, everyday multilingualism in the country, and, of course, the recent founding of the Culture & Computation Lab.

Link: Listen to the episode on buzzsprout.com

Update, 27.05.2022: We have identified suitable candidates for both positions. Please do not submit your profiles for these jobs anymore. Thank you for your interest in working with us!

As we are just about to launch the lab officially, we are currently looking to hire two full-time postdoctoral reseachers that will be directly affiliated with the lab. Both postdocs will be involved in building up the lab and developing workflows and services the lab offers to the Department of the Humanities. Additionally, each postdoc will have the opportunity to pursue their personal resarch project in the context of the lab.

Given the interdisciplinary nature of the lab, we are seeking to hire people with complementary profiles. Both positions are funded for 3 + 2 years and will be open until filled.

Position 1

• postdoctoral researcher in Cultural Data Science
• ideally with a background in Computer Science or Data Science
• should have an interest in working with cultural data
• a background in NLP will be a plus
• the full profile can be found here: not valid anymore

Position 2

• postdoctoral researcher in Cultural Analytics
• ideally with a background in Humanties or Digital Humanities research
• should have an interst in working with computational methods
• a background in Linguistics or Media Studies will be a plus
• the full profile can be found here: not valid anymore

If you want to apply for one of the positions, just follow the link and submit your profile through the official recruitment platform of the university. In case of any questions, just reach out to us via e-mail.

Every new journey begins with preparations, like, a lot of them. This one started already some three years ago, when a couple of colleagues from the Department of Humanties sat together to discuss the state and future of the department. And while we found many diverse and innovative lines of research in the different institutes, the relative absence of projects and scholars engaging with digital or computational research was striking to us. This was even more true, as one of the main research priorities the University of Luxembourg has deined for itself revolves around the notion of Data Science. And the same holds true for the funding priorities of the national funding agency, the FNR.

Against this backdrop, by involving many different colleages from the department and faculty, and by tinkering the idea of creating a department-level research lab that would tackle the specific opportunities and challanges of digitization from a scholarly point of view, the concept for the Culture & Computation Lab was born. The main idea behind the lab stems from two sources: a) the highly interdisciplinary setup of the Department of Humanities that includes a variety of scholarly disciplines, and b) the fact that among the many facilities in the research landscape engaging with digital change, hardly any seems to highlight the specific contribution the humanities can make to a better understanding and close monitoring of the fundamental change the digital revolution induces in all domains of cultural practice.

This rationale is the point of departure for our new lab, and for everything that it will bring about. We will tackle the rise of machine learning ("AI") as a mass technique and its consequences for all aspects of everyday life – including research. In doing so, we will establish a critical culture-analytical perspective on the manifold phenomena that relate to it, such as social and cultural engineering, the politics of classification, or the role of the humanities as a critical mirror in a computaterized world. Beyond that, we seek to contribute to a cultural grounding of computational methods in disciplines such as Natural Language Processing to further its understanding of language as deeply rooted in cultural practice.