PhD course: Living with algorithms: Power , practices, and people in a datafied world

Dates: February 7-9 2024
Deadline for application: 7 December 2023

Algorithms have come to play a critical role in shaping our lives. Tech giants, government agencies, NGOs and many other actors are turning interactions into data, targeting and shaping preferences and behaviors across a range of social settings. Life chances and opportunities increasingly rely on systems that allocate welfare, jobs, loans, credit, housing, insurance,justice, and education based on a range of computationally generated metrics, scores, and rankings.These types of datafied and algorithmic techniques have been criticized for their opacity and secrecy, and tendencies to stereotype, stigmatize and deepen forms of inequality. Using analytic sensibilities from Science & Technology Studies (STS), anthropology of technology, and Critical Data and Algorithm Studies, we ask: what happens if we study algorithmic systems through the experiences and practices of all kinds of people: experts, citizens, developers, consumers and users.

The PhD course will be taught by Minna Ruckenstein, Maja Hojer Bruun and Helene Ratner. The PhD course will take place at DPU – Danish School of Education, Aarhus University, Copenhagen campus. See more here.