
Track 10
Body-politics of the machines:
Troubles WITH/IN/OUT art, body, perception, politics, and technology.
Track chair Ingrid Cogne, Patrícia J. Reis
Within the cross-disciplinary research field art – science – technology, it has been widely remarked how the proliferation of new technologies affects human and non-human bodies in multiple ways—including perceptually, intellectually, culturally, socially, environmentally, ecologically, ethically, and politically.
Evidence can be found for example in the ways in which humans have been adjusting their bodies and behaviors to automatic workflows or in the development of genetic engineering to modify species that can cope with the current standards of living.
The rapid advance of artificial intelligence, artificial emotion, human-robotics interfaces, and genetics, points to the idea of expanding the body to a facilitated and re-empowered artificial existence. Technologies of emersion—such as VR, AR, and brain interfaces—promise the alienation of reality and call for the transcendence of the body and immaterial existence. Both scenarios persist on thinking future technology in an anthropocentric way and call for the necessity of rethinking the body.
Body-politics of the machines aims at re-creating a space wherein
The tracked topics include – and are not limited to:
- Situating troubles: Intersectionality and bodily relationalities.
- Machines and automatic systems of demystification.
- Machines as bodies and bodies as machines.
- Innovative interfaces of body affection and sensorial adjustment.
- Relational interfaces – between the self, one’s body, and the body of spectators.
- Thinking the body: emancipation strategies and speculative methodologies.
- Power of machines in periods of conflict: VR, AR systems and other immersion technologies aligned with body and politics.
- Disembodiment, obliteration, and technological development.
POM Beirut Tracks
(based on the call for topics)
Based on the first call for topics, the call is now open for individual submissions within the following tracks:
01.Track: Arab revolutions: Refugees, Communication technology, Mobile connectivity.
02.Track: Terrorism machines: Art production, Sociopolitical implications.
03.Track: Fourth Industrial Revolution (IR 4.0): Art, Cyberphysics, Automated creativity.
04.Track: The Battlefield of Vision: Perceptions of War and Wars on Perception.
05.Track: Internet of things: Dystopian Artificial Intelligence, Black Boxes.
06.Track: Living machines: Wars within living organisms.
07.Track: Artificial intelligence for art AIA: Computational creativity, Neural networks, Simulating human activity.
08.Track: Permanent Telesurveillance: Privacy, data protection, panopticon.
09.Track: The Politics of Evidence: Refugees, Frictions, Sound-representation.
10.Track: Body-politics of the machines: Troubles WITH/IN/OUT art, body, perception, politics, and technology.
11.Track: The Ecosystem Analogy: Machinery of Nature, Borrowed landscapes, Anthropology of the near.
Submission information
last updated January 8th, 2019
Notification of acceptance will be announced by the end of March 2019.
Individual proposals should consist of a 300-word abstract.
All submissions will be reviewed, according to the highest international academic standards.
Submitters should also upload a short bio file, no longer than a ½ page per person.
Please note that there will be a conference fee payable by all participants and delegates of the conference (Fees and packages will be announced in January 2019).
POM Beirut 2019 committees
last updated January 8th, 2019
POM Series executive committee
Dr. Morten SØNDERGAARD and Dr. Laura BELOFF.
POM Beirut 2019 Steering Committee
Dr. Morten SØNDERGAARD, Dr. Laura BELOFF, Dr. Hassan CHOUBASSI, Mr. Joe ELIAS, and Mrs. Sahar CHARARA.
POM Beirut 2019 Organizing Committee
Dr. Hassan CHOUBASSI, Mr. Joe ELIAS, Mrs. Sahar CHARARA, Dr. Fadi YAMMOUT, Dr. Walid RAAD, Ms. Fatima ABOU NASSIF, and Mr. Tarek Mourad.
More information
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