Locating Media Lecture Series, University of Siegen, Room AH-217/218, Tuesday (varying times)
http://www.locatingmedia.uni-siegen.de/2018/05/02/locating-media-lecture-series-interface-cultures/
The Locating Media Lecture in the summer semester 2018 addresses the subject of Interface Cultures. It explores the field of interface studies by drawing on a set of different perspectives and projects. It follows the premise that the interface is an ideological construct marked by power relations that one can address theoretically (What does the term ‘interface’ denote? How does one study interface cultures?), historically (Where do interfaces come from? In which contexts have they been deployed?) and/or aesthetically (What regimes of the sensible do interfaces install? How do they structure performances in the sense of action grammars?).
The overarching question of the lecture series is: How can one criticize an interface? What criteria are relevant for this pursuit at all and which methodical and theoretical approaches have been provided towards this goal? As a cultural form, contemporary interface arrangements should be investigated critically with regards to the subject positions they provide for, the actions they afford or discourage, the ways in which they structure people’s access to and perception of computers. Whereas many of these aspects are centered on user interfaces in a narrower sense, the term is also useful to address the operationality of data infrastructures (e.g. APIs, physical infrastructures of the Internet and their various interfaces), and the power relations attached to these.
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