# The Anthropology of Cybercultures

The Instructor in interaction with Stelarc's Prosthetic Head at the InterAccess Gallery, Toronto, Canada, 29 March 2003. (Photo courtesy of Andrew Clement.)

### Instructor(s)

Prof. Lucy Suchman

### MIT Course Number

21A.850J / STS.484J

### As Taught In

Spring 2009

### Level

Graduate

###

Some Description
Instructor(s) | Prof.
As Taught In | Spring 2002
Course Number | 2.24
Level | Undergraduate/Graduate
Features | Lecture Notes, Student Work

## Course Description

## Course Features

- Assignments: written with examples

## Course Description

This course explores a range of contemporary scholarship oriented to the study of 'cybercultures,' with a focus on research inspired by ethnographic and more broadly anthropological perspectives. Taking anthropology as a resource for cultural critique, the course will be organized through a set of readings chosen to illustrate central topics concerning the cultural and material practices that comprise digital technologies. We'll examine social histories of automata and automation; the trope of the 'cyber' and its origins in the emergence of cybernetics during the last century; cybergeographies and politics; robots, agents and humanlike machines; bioinformatics and artificial life; online sociality and the cyborg imaginary; ubiquitous and mobile computing; ethnographies of research and development; and geeks, gamers and hacktivists. We'll close by considering the implications for all of these topics of emerging reconceptualizations of sociomaterial relations, informed by feminist science and technology studies.

## Related Content

## Course Collections

See related courses in the following collections:

### Find Courses by Topic

- Anthropology > Cultural Anthropology
- Anthropology > Ethnography
- Media Studies
- Media Studies > Digital Media

Lucy Suchman. 21A.850J The Anthropology of Cybercultures. Spring 2009. Massachusetts Institute of Technology: MIT OpenCourseWare, https://ocw.mit.edu. License: Creative Commons BY-NC-SA.

For more information about using these materials and the Creative Commons license, see our Terms of Use.