AI imaginaries and counter-visions in higher education

Joint CDER / Nuffield College Sociology Seminar

Drawing on science and technology studies, feminist studies and labour studies, this talk examines how a range of technologies marketed as artificial intelligence are reshaping academic working conditions, and how academic unions and student organisers in the US are responding. Academic workers have drawn on strategies including collective bargaining, open letters, teach-ins, protests and the democratisation of procurement to challenge dominant AI imaginaries. The talk argues that by examining contemporary AI’s relationship to long-standing university labour hierarchies and the military-academic-industrial complex, academic workers can develop robust counter-visions for greater workplace democracy.

The Sociology Seminar Series is convened by Zachary Parolin and Carlo Perrotta. For more information about any of the seminars in the series, please contact sociology.secretary@nuffield.ox.ac.uk.