Interrogating Datafication

What constitutes a data practice and how do contemporary digital media technologies reconfigure our understanding of practices in general? Autonomously acting media, distributed digital infrastructures, and sensor-based media environments challenge the conditions of accounting for data practices both theoretically and empirically. Which forms of cooperation are constituted in and by data practices? And how are human and nonhuman agencies distributed and interrelated in data-saturated environments? The volume collects theoretical, empirical, and historiographical contributions from a range of international scholars to shed light on the current shift from media to data practices.

Marcus Burkhardt is a lecturer in media studies at University of Siegen and principal investigator at the Collaborative Research Center 1187 »Media of Cooperation«, University of Siegen.

Daniela van Geenen is a Ph.D. candidate at the DFG Collaborative Research Center 1187 »Media of Cooperation« at the University of Siegen, after receiving her MA from Utrecht University. Her research lies at the interface of media studies and science and technology studies (STS), with particular focus on (critical) data studies, software, device, and infrastructure Studies. In her Ph.D. project she investigates the sociomaterial organization, (data) practices, and values in/of urban sensing, paying specific attention to cases of environmental sensing in relation to mobility monitoring and planning. She is also a lecturer in Data Journalism and Visualization at the University of Applied Sciences Utrecht.

Carolin Gerlitz is a professor of digital media and methods at the University of Siegen and member of the Digital Methods Initiative Amsterdam. She is co-speaker of the DFG Collaborative Research Centre 1187 »Media of Cooperation« and the DFG Graduate School »Locating Media«. Her research interests are social media and platform studies, app studies, inventive digital methods, sensor media, quantification, automation, and issue mapping.

Sam Hind is a research associate in SFB1187 »Media of Cooperation« at the University of Siegen.

Timo Kaerlein (Dr. phil.) ist Akademischer Rat im Institut für Medienwissenschaft der Ruhr-Universität Bochum. Von 2011 bis 2014 war er Kollegiat im Graduiertenkolleg »Automatismen« an der Universität Paderborn. Seine Forschungsschwerpunkte sind digitale Nahkörpertechnologien, Theorie, Ästhetik und Kritik von Interfaces, Medienkulturen der Obsoleszenz und Social Robotics.