Spring 2020 | LANT 2900 | CRN 7491 | Monday 4:00 – 6:40pm | 6 East 16th St #600
Greta Byrum | byrumm@newschool.edu | office hours Mondays and Tuesdays by appointment (write me!)
Shannon Mattern | matterns@newschool.edu | 6 E 16th St #929 | office hours by appointment (write me!)
While we imagine an Internet that blankets the earth, providing even its most remote and marginalized inhabitants with seamless connectivity, the reality is that a sizable portion of the world’s population lacks reliable access. Here in New York, as across most of the US — especially in rural and poorer urban areas — roughly 30% of households still lack access to broadband. New York City’s just-released Internet Master Plan calls for updated next-generation digital infrastructure, with a promise to afford universal, equitable access to this 21st-century utility: the network.
Building on existing anthropological, media studies, and urban studies research about infrastructures, networks, and digital technologies, this seminar-workshop will engage with NYC’s forthcoming plan to help us better understand the interplay between technical and social network infrastructures. The laying of wires and installation of antennae involve the embodiment of politics and values, just like the buildout of telephone wires, cable systems, and even highway and postal networks. We’ll examine the evolution of networks, and use NYC’s digital master plan as a practical case to understand the equity implications of network design, suggesting ways to build on the existing work of practitioners, activists, scholars, planners, and designers to create healthier sociotechnical ecosystems. We’ll also speak with researchers and activists who’ve practiced media and network ethnography; meet with city officials and local community leaders; embark on field trips around the city; design our own speculative networks; and work with NYC’s digital equity community to formulate a response to the Plan, including proposed community benefits and impact indicators.
Original Version: While we imagine an Internet that blankets the earth, providing even its most remote and marginalized inhabitants with seamless connectivity, the reality is that a sizable portion of the world’s population lacks reliable access to a high-speed Internet connection, which is fundamental to so many social practices and daily operations. Here in New York, as across most of the US — especially in rural and poorer urban areas — roughly 30% of households still lack access to broadband. The OneNYC 2050 plan calls for updated next-generation digital infrastructure, with a promise to release a first-of-its-kind “city broadband master plan” in late 2019. That plan aspires to enable universal broadband and digital literacy programming access across the five boroughs. Building on existing anthropological, media studies, and urban studies research about infrastructures and digital technologies, this seminar-workshop will engage with NYC’s forthcoming plan to help us better understand the processes by which technical and social infrastructures are designed and built in tandem — and how the laying of wires and installation of antennae also involve the embodiment of politics and values. We’ll examine the plan to understand its equity implications, identifying gaps and opportunities and suggesting ways to build on the existing work of practitioners, activists, scholars, planners, and designers to create healthier digital ecosystems. We’ll also speak with researchers and activists who’ve practiced media and network ethnography; meet with city officials and local community leaders; embark on field trips around the city; install our own pilot network; and suggest digital equity and community wellness benchmarks and metrics to improve the outcomes of the digital master plan.