[Air-L] CrAIC and Digital Majority Centre Seminars - If AI is so great, why am I tired all the time?

[Andrea Medrado]

Dear all.
Happy New Year!
We are excited to host two invited speakers for the first seminar of 2026 this Thursday at the Department of Communications, Drama, and Film, as part of a joint event between our Critical AI Centre (CrAIC) and Digital Majority Centre. Please find details below, sign up via Eventbrite, and we hope to see you there in person or online!

Critical AI Centre & Digital Majority Centre Joint Seminar
Thursday 15th January 3-5pm GMT
TS2, Alexander Building, Thornlea & Online

Dr Sarah Shugars (they/them), Rutgers University - profile
If AI is so Great, then Why am I Tired All the Time?
While the collection of technologies commonly known as “AI” have been developed and interrogated by researchers for decades, these tools have only recently captured the public’s attention. The widespread availability of these technologies has quickly impacted multiple facets of society, raising important ethical and practical questions about how these tools should be used and studied. This talk examines the social and technical development of AI and reflects on how social scientists could and should interact with these tools—or not—as objects of study as well as tools for research and teaching. Particular attention will be given to the limitations of these technologies, their ethical and environmental impacts, and their appropriateness for different scholarly tasks.

Prof Bilge Yesil (she/her), City University of New York - profile
Talking Back to the West: How Turkey Uses Counter-Hegemony to Reshape the Global Communication Order
Turkey’s global communication apparatus has expanded remarkably since the 2010s under the Erdogan regime, promoting the country as a rising power while discrediting the West. Part of this project involves Turkey’s efforts toward digital sovereignty, including regulating global platforms and promoting domestic technological infrastructure. Although Erdogan's proxies claim to decolonize the global communication landscape and advocate for the Global South, Yesil argues that their counter-hegemonic mobilization is transactional, selective, and exclusionary and provides critical insights into the politics of victimhood and the essentialization of East–West binaries.
All the best,
Andrea Medrado, Patrick Gildersleve, Brett ZehnerThe Critical AI Centre, University of Exeter