Since its beginning, the Center for the Humanities and the Public Sphere has strived to offer an annual speaker series that brings scholars and practitioners to campus to present their research to faculty, students, and members of the public. Since 2019, the series has turned to the question of rethinking the public sphere, a key component of the Center’s title. In the decade plus since the Humanities Center’s founding, the understanding of the public sphere has developed from an idealist vision of rational encounter to a multitude of overlapping spheres shaped
by stratification, medialization, and datafication. We ask how to theorize the public sphere in these emerging contexts.
In the 2020-21 academic year, the series focused on Data & Democracy to offer humanities approaches to the questions of algorithms and machine learning in their historical and contemporary contexts, while also looking to the future. The four speakers — Katherine Chandler (Georgetown University), Catherine D’Ignazio (Massachusetts Institute for Technology), Ruha Benjamin (Princeton University), and Sylvester Johnson (Virginia Tech) — responded to the challenges of current machine learning with wide-ranging insight.
Prof. Chandler researches the history of drones, particularly in relationship to military history and their current use for humanitarian purposes. In addition to her lecture, she offered a workshop, in which advanced graduate students and faculty members discussed her recent work-in-progress.
Prof. D’Ignazio, the foremost scholar of feminist data science, surveyed biases in data science and offered methods on how to overcome them. In additional workshops, she responded to research projects by doctoral students and engaged in a conversation with faculty members on feminist methodologies in data science.
Prof. Benjamin similarly presented on the centrality of race in algorithmic biases and offered visions of alternative imagination of technology. Students who had read her book prior to her virtual visit had the opportunity to meet with her and discuss her work.
Finally, Prof. Johnson concluded the speaker series with an intellectual tour de force reflecting on the relation of technology and humanity, beginning with the question of who is accorded the feeling of pain and turning to contemporary human-machine integration in prosthetics. Generous with his time, Prof. Johnson met with different constituencies on UF campus, from faculty and administrators to students and research and foundation staff, to engage in a conversation about the UF AI initiative. Held virtually, the series attracted more than 500 attendees and engendered conversations about future scholarship, as well as ethical and just technology.
Voices from Lecture Attendees and Workshop Participants
“Drones and artificial intelligence are changing the future of our society. Dr. Chandler’s lecture captured the use of drones and how this use has penetrated our military and civilian lives. The assumption of privacy may not be possible in the future because of the usage of drones.” – Brian Marra, Undergraduate History major and Humanities Engagement Scholar
“Dr. D’Iganzio’s lecture was a terrific delineation of why feminist intersectional analysis is essential to data science; how race, gender, sexuality, class and other axes of power shape and are shaped by “big” data; and how feminist anti-racist data science can be a tool for social justice.” – Bonnie Moradi, Ph.D., Director, Center for Gender, Sexualities, and Women’s Studies Research; Professor of Psychology
“Dr. Benjamin’s visit was integral to current conversations on abolition, reformation, and technology. Her discussion with students was richly generous and invigorating as she shared mentorship and testimony. Her lecture and conversation reminded us that Black feminist theory remains an essential, foundational theory across all disciplines — especially, robotics and AI.” – Kimberly Williams, Ph.D. student, Department of English
“Dr. Johnson’s presentation and many generous meeting discussions provided UF participants a wealth of wisdom in how to approach research, teaching, and learning involving AI applications in a truly multidisciplinary manner. He spoke to the hunger that I have observed among our professional, graduate and undergraduate students for more opportunities to work and study across the humanities, arts, and STEM disciplines toward more holistic and sustained solutions to the pressing questions in AI, and I believe he has catalyzed our moving forward in creating such opportunities.” – Angela Lindner, Ph.D., Associate Provost for Undergraduate Affairs; Associate Professor, Environmental Engineering Sciences