Life after New Media: Mediation as a Vital Process by Sarah Kember and Joanna Zylinska, MIT Press:

In Life after New Media, Sarah Kember and Joanna Zylinska make a case for a significant shift in our understanding of new media. They argue that we should move beyond our fascination with objects — computers, smart phones, iPods, Kindles — to an examination of the interlocking technical, social, and biological processes of mediation. Doing so, they say, reveals that life itself can be understood as mediated — subject to the same processes of reproduction, transformation, flattening, and patenting undergone by other media forms.

By Kember and Zylinska’s account, the dispersal of media and technology into our biological and social lives intensifies our entanglement with nonhuman entities. Continue reading

Theorems, Proofs, Rebuttals, and Propositions: A Conference of Theoretical Theater :: Open Call for Performances-as-Theories — Deadline: August 15, 2012.

Through this Open Call, four performances/theories will be selected by a peer panel. Over the course of three months, the conference organizers will provide space and other resources to these theorizing projects.

Performance-makers/theorists need not have any theater or formal artistic background, but must propose to use the form of performance to propose a theoretical position or question. The process of performance-makers/theorists is likely to resemble the following: Continue reading

Virality: Contagion Theory in the Age of Networks by Tony D. Sampson, University of Minnesota Press:

In this thought-provoking work, Tony D. Sampson presents a contagion theory fit for the age of networks. Unlike memes and microbial contagions, Virality does not restrict itself to biological analogies and medical metaphors; it instead points toward a theory of contagious assemblages, events, and affects. For Sampson, contagion is how society comes together and relates.

“Tarde and Deleuze come beautifully together in this outstanding book, the first to really put forward a serious alternative to neo-Darwinian theories of virality, contagion, and memetics. A thrilling read that bears enduring consequences for our understanding of network cultures. Unmissable.” — Tiziana Terranova, author of Network Culture Continue reading

Remix Theory: The Aesthetics of Sampling by Eduardo Navas, Springer:

Remix Theory: The Aesthetics of Sampling is an analysis of Remix in art, music, and new media. Navas argues that Remix, as a form of discourse, affects culture in ways that go beyond the basic recombination of material. His investigation locates the roots of Remix in early forms of mechanical reproduction, in seven stages, beginning in the nineteenth century with the development of the photo camera and the phonograph, leading to contemporary Remix culture. This book places particular emphasis on the rise of Remix in music during the 1970s and ’80s in relation to art and media at the beginning of the twenty-first Century. Navas argues that Remix is a type of binder, a cultural glue — a virus — that informs and supports contemporary culture. Continue reading

Somatics & Technology Conference and Workshop :: June 22-23, 2012 :: University of Chichester, UK :: Call for Papers, Artworks, and Presentations — Deadline: April 28.

The first conference of its kind in the UK to disseminate a spectrum of digital arts linked with the Somatic, this event will integrate advanced critical and theoretical perspectives. Through keynote presentations, papers, roundtable discussions led by keynote speakers, a series of workshops and an art exhibit, the conference offers the opportunity for both practical and theoretical understanding of its theme. Continue reading

You are invited to apply for a place in the 2012 Session of the Johannesburg Workshop in Theory and Criticism (University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa). The 2012 Session, Futures of Nature, is part of a drive within the humanities to reframe the disciplines and critical theory in light of the environmental emergency that is said to endanger most species on the planet, including our own.

We will reflect on some of the major challenges relating to the contemporary conditions and the long-term sustainability of life on Earth. Ours is an age characterized by the indelible imprint of human activity on the Earth’s climate, its geology and its conditions – a process which may lead to the planet’s becoming inhospitable to human life. It is also an era that blurs the distinction between human history and culture and the Earth’s natural history and material composition. Continue reading

Theory in Action, the journal of the Transformative Studies Institute (quarterly publication print ISSN: 1937-0229 electronic ISSN: 1937-0237), is an interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed journal, whose scope ranges from the local to the global. Its aim is to provide a forum for the exchange of ideas and the discussion of current research (qualitative and quantitative) on the interconnections between theory and action aimed at promoting social justice broadly defined.

The journal editorial board does not privilege any particular theoretical tradition or approach and there are no word or page limits for its articles. TIA publishes papers that connect academic scholarship with activism, what R.K. Merton calls ‘theories of the middle range.’ TIA values radical and unconventional ideas, expressed in different styles, whether academic or journalistic. Continue reading

404 International Festival of Art & Technology :: Open Call — Deadline: February 28, 2012. Continue reading

Theory Beyond Codes: Haptics, Mobile Handhelds, and other “Novel” Devices: The Tactile Unconscious of Reading across Old and New Media by Rachel Lee :: CTHEORY: Theory, Thechnology, Culure VOL 35, NOS 1-2 :: Editors: Arthur and Marilouise Kroker.

I. Don’t Press. Just Touch

In a 2007 news article in the ~Korea Times~ covering the then innovative technology of the capacitance v. resistive (i.e., pressure sensitive) touch screens, Cho Jin-Seo uses the lead-in “Don’t Press. Just Touch” to capture the habituated finger knowledge one would have to incorporate in order to switch from the more familiar interface of ATM’s and cashier check-out stands to the newer interfaces of mobile devices. [1] Continue reading