Interweaving technologies: the aesthetics of digital urban living

CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

Conference at Aarhus University, Denmark. 21-23 April 2010

The urban environment is increasingly formed by the development of digital and mobile media. In this development there is no lack of investment in how these new technologies can be directed at making our lives both easier and more fun. But one could argue that we still need to find a proper ground for discussing these innovations in light of art, aesthetics and socio-cultural aspects.

Although these new technologies are generic in structure, they shape the environment differently, based on the context and site in which they are interwoven. There is a need for critical attention - be that from the viewpoint of an auditory or software culture, critical design, mobile or locative media art, or through a focus on the various strategies that come into play in the appropriation of the digital urban space (bricolage, interventions, hacktivism or the exploration of playful and performative strategies).

A lot of research in Nordic countries is focused upon how digital technologies shape daily urban life. However, most of the examples drawn upon in this research take place in large metropoli in the US and Asia, which raises the question of how we reflect on pervasive, locative or ubiquitous technologies in light of the smaller metropoli (as found in the Nordic region), the provincial or even the rural.

Relevant discussions are the interweavings of:
- the innovative and the aesthetic;
- the optimistic and the critical views on technology;
- the provincial everyday and the spectacular metropolis;
- the central square and the suburbs; the individual and the collective; and
- the mesh that folds and unfolds between situations and technologies.

This conference is aimed at gathering researchers interested in the aesthetics and socio-cultural aspects of situated and ubiquitous technologies. In addition, we hope that this conference will provide a fertile ground for discussing how we can use the specific Nordic way of constructing a society (in political constitutions, sets of values, existing practices, and the commonsensical traits of our everyday cultures and forms of life) as a backdrop for discussions of digital urban living.

The conference format will comprise invited keynotes and individual presentations of papers. A number of workshops aimed to facilitate further discussions of the conference topics through experimental group work will also be held. All workshops will have to produce an outcome that can be exhibited and presented at the closing reception (as posters or in a medium related to the workshop topic).

Relevant topics for the individual presentations include (but are not limited to):
The research areas of:
- auditory culture
- software culture
- urban cultural geography
- critical design
- mobile and locative media art
The research agendas of:
- critical approaches to digital public space
- appropriation, bricolage, interventions and hacktivism
- playful and performative strategies

Submission format and deadlines (please refer to the Ubiquity website (http://ubiquity.nu/) or to the website of Digital Aesthetics Research Center (http://darc.imv.au.dk) for further guidelines):

10 February 2010: deadline for submission of abstracts of max 600 words. Abstracts will be peer reviewed. Accepted language is English only.
20 February 2010: authors receive comments on submitted abstracts.
20 March 2010: deadline for submission of final position papers of maximum 2500 words. Papers will be subjected to final evaluation as to whether they meet the conference topic. Accepted language is English only.
21-23 April 2010 (incl): conference
There is no specific paper template for the abstract submission. Authors with accepted abstracts will receive further information on templates to be used for the final position papers along with the acceptance email.

Submissions and questions regarding the conference can be directed at Lone Koefoed Hansen (koefoed@hum.au.dk) or Lars Bo Løfgreen (lbl@hum.au.dk). Also, if you are interested in running an exploratory workshop, please email us for further discussion. Probable workshops are: “Mapping the flows and characteristics of (digitized) urban landscapes”, “Sonification of urban life”, “Large screen visualisations in the city”, and “GPS-positioning and geotagging as aesthetic material”.

The conference is part of a number of events arranged by the research network “The Culture of Ubiquitous Information”; a Nordic interdisciplinary research network addressing an unresolved problem: the articulation of a conceptual apparatus in cultural theory and technology studies which affords an analysis and evaluation of ubiquitous computing as a contemporary development increasingly making itself felt socio-culturally.