January 2020 - Members - lists.sigcis.org

Fwd: SHOT Call for Proposals NoLa 2020
by Andrew Russell 10 Jan '20

10 Jan '20

Hi everyone - See below for the CFP for the SHOT 2020 meeting, which will be held jointly with History of Science Society in New Orleans. Deadlines are Feb 28, 2020. As usual, SIGCIS plans to hold a Sunday SIGCIS conference, with details and deadlines to be announced later on. Best regards, Andy > Begin forwarded message: > > From: Society for the History of Technology <shot.secretariaat(a)tue.nl> > Subject: SHOT Call for Proposals NoLa 2020 > Date: January 9, 2020 at 1:15:45 PM EST > To: arussell(a)arussell.org > Reply-To: shot.secretariaat(a)tue.nl > > > > Call For Proposals, Papers, and Sessions for SHOT 2020 now open > > SHOT Annual Meeting > New Orleans, 7-11 October 2020 > > > Dear SHOT Members, > 7 October, 2019 in Milan, Italy. > > The SHOT Program Committee is pleased to issue the Call for Papers and Sessions for the SHOT 2020 Annual Meeting, to be held 7-11 October, 2020 in New Orleans, USA > > > Link to CfP: CfP SHOT Annual Meeting New Orleans 2020 <http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=001RXQvwPRWyBtNhpd20MoAElk2J_b6l89QaCNrZsKv5dAa…> > > > SHOT and the Program Committee look forward to a vigorous, enthusiastic, and intellectually stimulating annual meeting in New Orleans! > > Please see the full text of the CfP below, or through this link <http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=001RXQvwPRWyBtNhpd20MoAElk2J_b6l89QaCNrZsKv5dAa…>, here we give you just a few headlines of the contents: > - Theme of this years CfP/Meeting "Environment, Infrastructure, and Social Justice." > - The 2020 SHOT Annual Meeting will be held jointly with the History of Science Society. > - For joint SHOT/HSS panel proposals, please submit proposals to both SHOT and HSS. > - For details about HSS panel submission, please visit the HSS webpage (https://hssonline.org/ <http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=001RXQvwPRWyBtNhpd20MoAElk2J_b6l89QaCNrZsKv5dAa…>). > - The Program Committee welcomes proposals of different types. > - The Program Committee will prioritize proposals that make a conscious effort to increase diversity > - Find Basic guidelines addressed > - Specific instructions related to submission details will appear on the SHOT webpage <http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=001RXQvwPRWyBtNhpd20MoAElk2J_b6l89QaCNrZsKv5dAa…>. > > > Annual Meeting Society for the History of Technology (SHOT): New Orleans, 7-11 October, 2020 - Call for Proposals FULL TEXT > > Dear Colleagues, > > The SHOT Program Committee is pleased to issue the Call for Papers and Sessions for the SHOT 2020 Annual Meeting to be held 7-11 October, 2020 in New Orleans. The 2020 SHOT Annual Meeting will be held jointly with the History of Science Society. > > SHOT is an interdisciplinary and international organization concerned with the history of technological devices, systems, and processes as well as with technology in history, culture, and society. We explore the production, circulation, appropriation, maintenance, and abandonment of technology under specific historical conditions. And we scrutinize these epistemic, economic, social, cultural, and political conditions. Our approaches are informed by a broad concept of technology, encompassing knowledge resources, practices, artifacts, and biofacts (artifacts in the realm of the living). Accordingly, the Committee invites paper and session proposals on any topic in a broadly defined history of technology, including topics that push the boundaries of the field. > > SHOT is committed to diversity. In addition to intellectual quality, we warmly welcome proposals that reflect diversity in their line-up of speakers, in particular with regard to career level, gender, and geography. The Program Committee will prioritize proposals that make a conscious effort to increase diversity: for example, proposals that are diverse in terms of temporal or geographic foci, proposals that include one or more female speakers, speakers at different professional stages, with different institutional affiliations, and/or different nationalities and geographies. > > > SHOT Annual Meeting 2020: > New Orleans: Environment, Infrastructure, and Social Justice > > New Orleans. The name alone conjures a host of images: exotic food, magnificent architecture, distinct music and dialects, and devastating hurricanes. Playwright Tennessee Williams famously labeled it the last frontier of Bohemia. For some, it is the most European of American cities. For others, it is the northern most Caribbean port. > > Nicknamed the Crescent City because of its rather unique geography-the Mississippi River curves deeply around its urbanized core-New Orleans is a vital commercial center for both domestic and global trade and consistently ranks as a top destination for national and international tourists. Located near the mouth of the continent's largest river, its port provides access to thirty-plus major inland hubs via 14,000 miles of waterways, six Class 1 railroads, and interstate roads. One third of all seafood consumed in the United States originates from Louisiana, with much of it harvested and processed near New Orleans. Additionally, with 88 percent of the country's offshore oil and gas rigs located off Louisiana's shore, the Greater New Orleans region is one of the world's leading markets for energy and petrochemical production, processing, and transportation. > > The city's substantial cultural and economic presence belies its precarious environmental and social realities, however. Founded as a French colonial capital in 1718 on a deltaic lobe formed nearly two thousand years after the great pyramids of Giza were built, its residents have waged a constant battle to hold the surrounding water at bay. Today, nearly half of New Orleans exists below sea level. Indeed, the channelization of the Mississippi River, coupled with the vast pumping system constructed to drain storm water from the interior bowl created by the levees, has deprived the landscape of the sediment that a naturally overflowing river provides. The result is an actively sinking city, despite the injection of billions in federal post-Hurricane Katrina recovery aid. And with nearly twenty percent of its citizens, 60 percent of whom are people of color, living at or below the poverty line, New Orleans remains one of the nation's poorest metropolitan areas, a grim reminder of its past status as the largest slave market in North America. Moreover, the 85-mile corridor of petrochemical and plastic refineries and plants above New Orleans, many of which are located on former sugar plantations, is widely reported to have some of America's highest levels of cancer-causing chemicals in the air. > > To assert that New Orleans has a troubled, dichotomous history is to state the obvious. And yet she persists, a fabled, hemispheric crossroads with an unmatched joie de vivre. That SHOT and the Society for the History of Science in New Orleans have chosen to co-locate in New Orleans in 2020, the 15thanniversary of Hurricane Katrina and the 10th anniversary of the Deep Horizon oil spill, is no small matter. This co-mingling of associations offers scholars a splendid opportunity to reflect on the relationship between the environment, infrastructure, and social justice and how these elements contribute to the ongoing story of New Orleans and to the maintenance of our modern world. To pay tribute to the location of the meeting, we encourage proposals that relate to a broadly interpreted theme of "Environment, Infrastructure, and Social Justice." > > Infrastructure is an inherently social mode of modification of natural environments. It is the most basic form of technological collaboration; it is fundamental for society's functioning; and it is indispensable to other technological developments. Infrastructure requires vision, planning, engineering, management, and maintenance. It also necessitates considerations of risk and an anticipation of environmental events with potential to seriously impact human lives. Colloquially described as "natural disasters," these events become "disasters" for humans only when infrastructure fails. > > At the same time, infrastructure is also a symbol of nationhood and civilization. It is often cited as a justification for conflict, imperialism, and displacement. The benefits that it offers and harm that it causes are not distributed equally. Those who are displaced or otherwise affected by new infrastructure projects too often do not experience their benefits. And when infrastructure fails, the harm often falls disproportionally on those who are already socially and economically disadvantaged. > We invite SHOT participants to reflect on these themes from an historical as well as a contemporary perspective, and with respect to a variety of socio-cultural environments. Among the aspects which deserve discussion are how infrastructure modifies human and natural environments; how risk assessment influences infrastructure planning; how different societies approach infrastructure vis-à-vis other forms of technological development; and how climate change brings about reassessments of infrastructural needs. > > > For the 2020 meeting the Program Committee welcomes proposals of these types: > > Joint SHOT/HSS sessions: since this meeting will be held in conjunction with HSS, it is possible to submit a proposal that speaks to both SHOT and HSS communities, and which would appear on both programs. When submitting a joint proposal, indicate this fact in the abstract and make sure to submit an identical proposal through the HSS website. The program committees of both societies will evaluate these joint proposals. Deadline: February 28, 2020. > > Traditional sessions: sessions of 3 or 4 papers, with a chair listed in the session proposal. It is not necessary to have a commentator. However, if a commentator has a central role in the panel, they will be counted as an additional speaker. Deadline: February 28, 2020. > > Unconventional sessions: sessions with formats that diverge in useful ways from traditional sessions. These can include (but are not limited to) round-table sessions, workshop-style sessions with pre-circulated papers, "you write, I present" sessions, and poster sessions. Poster proposals should describe the content and the visual material to be used in the poster. Individuals whose posters are accepted must be available to talk about them in a lunch/evening slot to be decided by the program committee. The Program Committee encourages other creative formats to facilitate communication, dialogue, and audience involvement. The program committee will look favorably on formats that make sessions less hierarchical and reduce the 'distance' between audience and author and between author and commentator. Deadline: February 28, 2020. > > Open sessions: Individuals interested in finding others to join panel sessions may propose Open Sessions, starting January 1, with a final deadline of February 15. Open Session descriptions, along with the organizer's contact information, will appear on the SHOT website (the earlier the proposal is sent to SHOT, the earlier it can be posted to the website.) For individuals who want to join a proposed panel from the Open Sessions list, please contact the organizer for that panel, not the Program Committee. In order to give the session organizer sufficient time to select proposals and assemble the final panel, the deadline for submitting your paper proposal to the organizer is February 15, 2020. Open Session organizers will then assemble full panels and submit them through SHOT's online system by February 28, 2019. > > Individual papers: Proposals for individual papers will be considered, but the Program Committee will give preference to pre-organized sessions (traditional, unconventional, or completed open sessions). Scholars who might ordinarily propose an individual paper are encouraged to propose Open Sessions themselves or to join an Open Session. Deadline: February 28, 2020. > > > Other basic guidelines: > > SHOT allows the same speaker to present papers at consecutive meetings but turns down papers that are substantially the same as previously accepted ones. Any submission on the same topic should explain how the new paper differs from the prior presentation. > > Most pre-organized panels, if accepted, will remain as proposed. In select cases, depending on the quality and coherence of the individual papers, part of a panel may be turned down, merged into another panel, or combined with individual papers to form a new panel. If the panel can only work as one single unit, please specify "all or none" in the abstract. In this case, the Program Committee may reject the whole panel despite the presence of qualified individual papers. > > Individuals are permitted to take on multiple roles at SHOT, as well as additional roles at HSS. However, no individual is to give more than one titled paper or commentary for both societies. Additional presentations in SIGs, participation in roundtables, poster sessions, and other activities for which no title is listed in the SHOT meeting program are allowed; however, a paper at a graduate student workshop does count as a paper for this purpose. The SHOT Program Committee ensures there are no schedule conflicts between individual's various roles on the SHOT program. However, SHOT and HSS cannot resolve conflicts between papers/commentaries and other roles across societies. In cases when an individual's presentation or commentary would conflict with additional roles on the other society's program, the individual will be asked to forgo the additional role. > > Each panel proposal should be accompanied by a panel abstract that details: 1 the overall theme; 2 each individual panelist's contribution; 3 the role of a commentator (if any); 4 diversity statement (see above); 5 whether a given proposal desires "all or none"; and 6 whether any of the panelists is a candidate for SHOT's Robinson Prize. Individual paper proposals should indicate whether the presenter is a Robinson Prize candidate. > > Specific instructions related to submission details appear on the SHOT webpage (http://www.historyoftechnology.org <http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=001RXQvwPRWyBtNhpd20MoAElk2J_b6l89QaCNrZsKv5dAa…>). For joint SHOT/HSS panel proposals, please submit proposals to both SHOT and HSS. For details about HSS panel submission, please visit the HSS webpage (https://hssonline.org/ <http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=001RXQvwPRWyBtNhpd20MoAElk2J_b6l89QaCNrZsKv5dAa…>). > > > Society for the History of Technology, Sonja Beekers,Foundation for the History of Technology, POBox 513, IPO Building 2.31, Eindhoven, 5600 MB Netherlands > SafeUnsubscribe™ arussell(a)arussell.org <https://visitor.constantcontact.com/do?p=un&m=001Xz26gWD0CDOi01mES8w44A%3D%…> > Forward this email <http://ui.constantcontact.com/sa/fwtf.jsp?llr=ieifeldab&m=1103106318472&ea=…> | About our service provider <http://www.constantcontact.com/legal/service-provider?cc=about-service-prov…> > Sent by shot.secretariaat(a)tue.nl <mailto:shot.secretariaat@tue.nl> in collaboration with > <http://www.constantcontact.com/index.jsp?cc=TEM_BusLet_003&rmc=VF19_V8> > Try email marketing for free today! <http://www.constantcontact.com/index.jsp?cc=TEM_BusLet_003&rmc=VF19_V8>

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Early Computing in Britain
by Brian Randell 08 Jan '20

08 Jan '20

Hi: I’ve now seen and started to read Simon Lavington’s new book “Early Computing in Britain: Ferranti Ltd. and Government Funding, 1948 - 1958” (Springer, 2019) ISBN-13: 978-3030151027, 410 pages. I don’t think it has been mentioned yet on SIGCIS, though it certainly deserves to be! From the Preface: There is a tendency to view computer history either from a top-down or a bottom-up. perspective. Enthroned at the top of the historical landscape are the policymakers: government mandarins and board-level industrialists who view each new generation of computers through their shifting requirements of economics, politics: and national defence. Far below these policymakers, and secure at the foundational. level, are the technology researchers and developers: the creators of theories and laboratory prototypes, whose motivation is the satisfaction of responding to challenges issued by their fellow academics. In between these two extremes is a largely unsung and heterogeneous collection of engineers, programmers and marketing staff who turn ideas into products, features into benefits and problems into solutions. Theirs is the song that you'll hear throughout this book. The focus of the story is particularly on those who worked for one manufacturing company, Ferranti Ltd., and for the nine end-user organisations who purchased the first Ferranti computers in the period 1951-1957. It is a story grounded in technology but brought alive by personal experiences and practical compromise. Here you’ll read of short-term social impacts and longer-term evolutionary adaptations, as new and untried equipment began to have an impact. Why is this story of relevance to the emergence of modern computers? The 10-year period 1948-1958 was of great significance. The first Ferranti computer, which was prosaically called the Mark I, was the first production machine to have been delivered anywhere. A copy of this and improved versions called the Mark I* (Mark One Star) were the first substantial computers to have been delivered in Canada, Holland and Italy. And whilst American companies such as UNIVAC and IBM were selling tens of computers to their home market during the early 1950s, Ferranti seemingly had the rest of the world to itself. <snip> Cheers Brian Randell School of Computing, Newcastle University, 1 Science Square, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE4 5TG EMAIL = Brian.Randell(a)ncl.ac.uk PHONE = +44 191 208 7923 URL = http://www.ncl.ac.uk/computing/people/profile/brianrandell.html

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Invention of LSFR random number algorithm
by Dr. Stefan Höltgen 08 Jan '20

08 Jan '20

Dear all, I am searching for the earliest implementation or mention of an LSFR for random number generation. The earliest mention of LSFR (found with Google Scholar) seems to be 1958: https://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/3614/bab2531.0001.0… Does anybody of you have further informations about the invention of that method? best, Stefan Höltgen --- Dienstadresse: Dr. Stefan Höltgen Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin Institut für Musikwissenschaft und Medienwissenschaft Fachbereich Medienwissenschaft Georgenstraße 47 Raum 2.26 (Signallabor) D-10117 Berlin Fon: ++49 (0)30 2093-66185 Fax: ++49 (0)30 2093-66181 E-Mail: stefan.hoeltgen(a)hu-berlin.de <mailto:stefan.hoeltgen@hu-berlin.de> Web: http://u.hu-berlin.de/hoeltgen <http://u.hu-berlin.de/hoeltgen> Sprechstunde: Mittwochs 17-18 Uhr (ohne Anmeldung)

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Good news
by Mar Hicks 08 Jan '20

08 Jan '20

Hi all, Given that we could all probably use some right about now, I thought I would share a roundup of recent good news involving several of our members. Each shows the impact studies of computing are having not just within our field but on the broader public discourse. 1) Safiya Noble’s Algorithms of Oppression, about the development of “digital redlining” and other racist online practices, was NYU’s bestselling book of the year and their top pick of all the books they’ve published this past decade. 2) Sarah Roberts’s recent book Behind the Screen, on the past, present, and future of commercial content moderation, was ranked one of the top 8 books of 2019 on privacy by BookAuthority. 3) Meryl Alper’s work on AI, bias, and disability discrimination was cited in Elizabeth Warren’s disability plan. You can read the coauthored paper, published by the AI Now Institute, here: https://ainowinstitute.org/disabilitybiasai-2019.pdf 4) Some good news of my own: Programmed Inequality received the 2019 Herbert Baxter Adams Prize in European History from the American Historical Association this weekend. 5) In job news: Whitney Pow, who works on queer and trans video game studies and computing history has accepted a full time job at NYU. Congrats Whitney! 5) Lastly, several books have recently added to the important, swiftly-growing body of work on Blackness and digital technologies, including André Brock’s Distributed Blackness, Ruha Benjamin’s Race After Technology, Charlton McIlwain’s Black Software, and Clyde Ford’s Think Black (about his and his father’s time at IBM). Feel free to add your own or others’ good news to the list. Best, Mar ______________________ Mar Hicks Associate Professor History of Technology Illinois Institute of Technology Chicago, IL USA mhicks1(a)iit.edu | marhicks.com | @histoftech Programmed Inequality: How Britain Discarded Women Technologists and Lost Its Edge in Computing www.programmedinequality.com

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[CfA EASST/4S Prague] Other Indigenous “Knowledge Engineering” Systems: Designing and operating knowledge technologies at scale in emerging worlds
by Yoehan Oh 06 Jan '20

06 Jan '20

Dear list members, Apologies for cross-posting. Please take into consideration submitting your abstract to the open panel session at the EASST/4S conference in Prague, August 2020, "Other Indigenous “Knowledge Engineering” Systems: Designing and operating knowledge technologies at scale in emerging worlds." The upcoming EASST/4S conference 2020, the joint conference of the annual European Science and Technology Studies (STS) conference and the worldwide major annual STS conference, will be held in Prague, August 18-21, 2020 (official website: https://www.easst4s2020prague.org/) If you have any question, feel free to contact me (ohy(a)rpi.edu) If you might, hopefully, find this interesting to others in your networks, please share it with them. Key dates and the CfA are as the following: KEY DATES 29 February 2020: Deadline for abstract submission: 15 April 2020: Notification of acceptance of all abstracts TITLE *Other Indigenous “Knowledge Engineering” Systems: Designing and operating knowledge technologies at scale in emerging worlds *(*Open panel 131*) ABSTRACT Some scholars in digital humanities and critical internet and digital technologies studies have asked for bringing critical concerns about race, gender, postcoloniality, and other inequal power structures to their field (Nakamura 2013; Noble et al. 2016; McPherson 2013; Posner 2016; Risam 2018; Benjamin 2019). One way to address those concerns is illuminating technically-inventive subjectivities, by appreciating and thus empowering them through conceptualizations they deserve. STSers have conceptualized them and their artifacts as “Black vernacular technological creativity,” “techno-vernacular creativity,” (Fouché 2006; Gaskins 2019), “innovation from below” (Williams 2018), “ethnocomputing,” (Petrillo 1994; Tedre et-al. 2006; Eglash 1999), “postcolonial computing,” (Irani et-al. 2010; cf. Burrell 2012), and “black software” (McIlwain 2019); historians of computing have studied information architectures, hardware, and software in the Middle East, Latin America, East Asia, Midwestern U.S., and (post-)communist contexts (Bowker 1994; Medina 2011; Tinn 2018; Rankin 2018; Švelch 2018; Biagioli et-al. 2019). To further these conceptualizations, this panel will focus on less resourceful worlds’ captures of knowledge technologies, predominated by a few resourceful countries’ R&D communities like U.S., Canada, some Western Europe countries, China, and Japan: Knowledge discovery by data, Data engineering, Semantic technologies, and Search engines, etc (Collins 1987; Forsythe 1993). Questions to be addressed are: How indigenous, aboriginal, vernacular, decolonial, de-ColdWar, or less capitalistically/settler-colonially exploitative the knowledge engineering practices at scales by technical actors in the underrecognized/emerging worlds can be? Which speculative, experimental, or empirical cases can we dig into as the Indigenous “Knowledge engineering” Systems (Watson-Verran et al. 1995; Brereton et-al. 2015; Chamunorwa et-al. 2018)? KEYWORDS: knowledge engineering, knowledge technologies, technological agency, indigenous knowledge systems, emerging worlds THREE CATEGOREIS: Big Data; Information, Computing and Media Technology; Postcolonial/Decolonial STS CONVENORS: Yoehan Oh, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Wish you a happy new year. Best, Yoehan REFERENCES * Acker, Amelia, and Joan Donovan. 2019. "Data craft: a theory/methods package for critical internet studies." *Information, Communication & Society *22(11): 1590-1609. * Aouragh, Miriyam, and Paula Chakravartty. 2016. "Infrastructures of empire: towards a critical geopolitics of media and information studies." *Media, Culture & Society *38(4): 559-575. * Benjamin, Ruha. 2019. *Race after technology: Abolitionist tools for the new Jim Code. *John Wiley & Sons. * Biagioli, Mario, and Vincent Antonin Lépinay, eds. 2019. *From Russia with Code: Programming Migrations in Post-Soviet Times. *Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press. * Bowker, Geoffrey C. 1994. *Science on the Run: Information management and industrial geophysics at Schlumberger, 1920-1940. *MIT press. * Brereton, Margot, Paul Roe, Ronald Schroeter, and A. Lee Hong. 2015. "Indigenous knowledge technologies: Moving from knowledge capture to engagement, reciprocity and use." In *At the Intersection of Indigenous and Traditional Knowledge and Technology Design, *edited by Nicola Bidwell and Heike Winschiers-Theophilus, 239-258. Informing Science. * Burrell, Jenna. 2012. *Invisible Users: Youth in the Internet cafés of urban Ghana. *MIT Press. * Chamunorwa, Michael Bosomefi, Heike Winschiers-Theophilus, and Tariq Zaman. 2018. "An Intermediary Database Node in the Namibian Communities Indigenous Knowledge Management System." In *Digitisation of Culture: Namibian and International Perspectives, *edited by Dharm Singh Jat, Jürgen Sieck, Hippolyte N'Sung-Nza Muyingi, Heike Winschiers-Theophilus, Anicia Peters, and Shawulu Nggada, 99-117. Singapore: Springer, * Collins, Harry M. 1987. "Expert systems and the science of knowledge." In *The social construction of technological systems: New directions in the sociology and history of technology, *edited by Wiebe E. Bijker, Thomas P. Hughes, Trevor Pinch, 329-348. MIT Press. * Ebner, Susanne. 2019. “Hierarchies of Knowledge: Usage of a Chinese Media App in Rural Tamil Nadu” presented at the 2019 Annual Meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science, New Orleans, U.S. * Eglash, Ron. 1999. *African fractals: Modern computing and indigenous design. *Rutgers University Press. * Forsythe, Diana E. 1993. "Engineering knowledge: The construction of knowledge in artificial intelligence." *Social studies of science *23(3): 445-477. * Fouché, Rayvon. 2006. "Say it loud, I'm black and I'm proud: African Americans, American artifactual culture, and black vernacular technological creativity." *American Quarterly *58(3): 639-661. * Gaskins, Nettrice R. 2019. “Techno-Vernacular Creativity and Innovation across the African Diaspora and Global South.” In *Captivating Technology: Race, Carceral Technoscience, and Liberatory Imagination in Everyday Life, *edited by Ruha Benjamin, 252-274. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press. * Irani, Lilly, Janet Vertesi, Paul Dourish, Kavita Philip, and Rebecca E. Grinter. 2010. "Postcolonial computing: a lens on design and development." In *Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on human factors in computing systems, *ACM. 1311-1320. * Kita, Chigusa, and Hyungsub Choi. 2016. "History of computing in East Asia." *IEEE Annals of the History of Computing *38(2): 8-10. * McIlwain, Charlton. 2019. *Black Software: The Internet and Racial Justice, from the AfroNet to Black Lives Matter. *Oxford University Press, USA. * McPherson, Tara. 2013. “US operating systems at mid-century: The intertwining of race and UNIX.” In *Race after the Internet, edited by Lisa Nakamura and Peter Chow-White, *27-43. Routledge. * Medina, Eden. 2011. *Cybernetic revolutionaries: Technology and politics in Allende's Chile. *MIT Press. * Nakamura, Lisa, and Peter Chow-White, eds. 2013. *Race after the Internet. *Routledge. * Noble, Safiya Umoja. 2018. *Algorithms of Oppression: How search engines reinforce racism. *NYU Press. * Noble, Safiya Umoja, and Brendesha M. Tynes. 2016. *The intersectional internet: Race, sex, class, and culture online. *Peter Lang International Academic Publishers. * Petrillo, Anthony. 1994. “Ethnocomputers in Nigerian Computer Education.” Paper presented at the 31st Annual Conference of the Mathematical Association of Nigeria (March 1994). * Philip, Kavita, Lilly Irani, and Paul Dourish. 2012. "Postcolonial computing: A tactical survey." *Science, Technology, & Human Values *37(1): 3-29. * Posner, Miriam. 2016. “What’s Next: The Radical Unrealised Potential of Digital Humanities.” In *Debates in the digital humanities 2016, *edited by Matthew K. Gold and Lauren F. Klein, 32-41. University of Minnesota Press. * Risam, Roopika. 2018. *New Digital Worlds: Postcolonial Digital Humanities in Theory, Praxis, and Pedagogy. *Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press. * Snow, Jackie. 2018. “We’re in a diversity crisis”: Cofounder of Black in AI on what’s poisoning algorithms in our lives.” *MIT Technology Review *(Feb 14, 2018). * Stöckelová, Tereza, and Jaroslav Klepal. 2018. "Chinese Medicine on the Move into Central Europe: A Contribution to the Debate on Correlativity and Decentering STS." *East Asian Science, Technology and Society. *12(1): 57-79. * Rankin, Joy Lisi. 2018. *A People's History of Computing in the United States. *Harvard University Press. * Stevens, Hallam. 2019. "Digital Infrastructure in the Chinese Register." *Made in China Journal. *4(2): 84-89. * Švelch, Jaroslav. 2018. *Gaming the Iron Curtain: How Teenagers and Amateurs in Communist Czechoslovakia Claimed the Medium of Computer Games. *MIT Press. * Tedre, Matti, Erkki Sutinen, Esko Kähkönen, and Piet Kommers. 2006. "Ethnocomputing: ICT in cultural and social context." *Communications of the ACM *49(1): 126-130. * Tinn, Honghong. 2018. "Modeling Computers and Computer Models: Manufacturing Economic-Planning Projects in Cold War Taiwan, 1959–1968." *Technology and culture *59(5): S66-S99. * Watson-Verran, Helen, and David Turnbull. 1995. "Science and other indigenous knowledge systems." In *Handbook of Science and Technology Studies, *2nd edition, edited by Jasanoff, S., G. E. Markle, J. Peterson, and T. Pinch, 115-139. Sage. * Williams, Logan D. A. 2018. *Eradicating Blindness: Global Health Innovation from South Asia. *Palgrave Macmillan. -- Yoehan Oh Doctoral Student Department of Science and Technology Studies Rensselaer Polytechnic institute 110 8th Street Troy, NY 12180 USA e-mail: ohy(a)rpi.edu phone: (518) 368-1257 pronoun: he/him

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History of Games CFP
by jaroslav＠svelch.com 06 Jan '20

06 Jan '20

Dear list members, I have realized - a bit late - that there is a CFP that I didn't notice posted here and that some of you might find interesting, for the History of Games conference. This year's topic is Transnational Game Histories: http://www.history-of-games.com/cfp/ and the conference will take place in Krakow, Poland, in late May. The majority of this conference has traditionally focused on computer and video games. The deadline is a week from now, on January 13, but might be extended. I'm on the conference's steering committee so I'll be happy to answer any questions! I'm pasting the full CFP below. Best, Jaroslav ----------------------------------------------- CFP: Transnational Games Histories 27th-29th May 2020 Collegium Maius (ul. Jagiello?ska 15), Jagiellonian University, Krakow The theme of the conference, Transnational Games Histories, reflects a changing awareness in the influence of games throughout time and space. Following from earlier calls for a broader and more inclusive approach to the histories of games (Therrien, 2012), games do not belong to one country, nation state or region. Through formal and informal networks (Wasiak, 2015) of production, distribution and consumption games pop up in areas far from their intended market (Swalwell, 2007). Indeed, when they permeate geographical and political boundaries they have the capacity to transform traditional ways of consuming media and even the way individuals interact within society (Svelch, 2018). In doing so, they alter contemporary notions of how these societies are viewed. As Marshall McLuhan wrote, as societies change, so do games. By exploring the transnational histories of games, this conference series seeks to provide a forum for presentation and discussion of how transnational games transform across local, regional, national, international and global spaces and times and how they challenge and rework or hold and replicate, the status quo of those societies (Debus and Hammeleff Jorgensen, 2017). Given the expansive, transnational, transformative and transdisciplinary reach and constitution of games histories, the conference welcomes original submissions from researchers and scholars working across the spectrum of academic disciplines, including, but not limited to: economic history; cultural history social history; computer science; military history; cultural history; media history; memory studies; sensory history; the history of technology; psychology of games; history of play; history of games, history of computing, art history; material histories; ethnography; historical archaeology; museology; information science; preservation; curation; education studies and heritage studies. Topics to be covered, can include, but are not limited to: - Board, card, table-top, playground, field, hand games - Computer, video and electric / electronic games - Histories and biographies of games designers and developers - Histories of hardware and software (including board, card, table-top, playground, field, hand games) - Histories of minorities in play and games - Local, regional and national game histories - Material games histories (storage, curation, display, upgrade, degradation) - Historical Studies of Gaming Media (Magazines, disks, cassettes etc.) - Sites of play (e.g. amusement arcades, theme parks, bowling alleys) - Historical anthropology of games - Animals and play - Cultural and political discourse of games - Histories of the games industry - Wargames and political deployment of games - Pinball and arcade games - Home or lone programming - Convergence of games with other games and media (e.g. chess, Tetris, pool) - Critical readings of historical games - Histories and biographies of players and their communities - Histories of games no longer played - Games and everyday life - Histories of games and education Submissions 750 words including references Open: 18th November 2019 Close: 13th January 2020 Notifications sent 29th February 2020 Submit via https://easychair.org/cfp/HoG2020 Jaroslav Švelch, Ph.D. New media and digital games scholar Assistant professor, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University, Prague ________________________________________________________ My book GAMING THE IRON CURTAIN: How Teenagers and Amateurs in Communist Czechoslovakia Claimed the Medium of Computer Games Out now on MIT Press, http://ironcurtain.svelch.com @raguklemenso Phone: +420 773 988 425

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Fw: [please forward] histories of computing in Asia: first call for papers
by Ceruzzi, Paul 04 Jan '20

04 Jan '20

Over the years, I have participated in several IFIP conferences, and I found them to be very worthwhile. Paul Ceruzzi ________________________________ From: Christopher Leslie <chrisleslienyc(a)hotmail.com> Sent: Saturday, January 4, 2020 6:52 AM To: Christopher Leslie <chrisleslienyc(a)hotmail.com> Cc: Martin Schmitt <schmitt(a)zzf-potsdam.de> Subject: [please forward] histories of computing in Asia: first call for papers External Email - Exercise Caution Dear Members and Affiliates of Working Group 9.7: Thanks to everyone's suggestions and support for this CFP. I am pleased to send along the official announcement. Would you please forward it to your colleagues and along your networks? If you have suggestions on how to improve the CFP, let me know because I plan to send out a reminder with additional details later. Sincerely, Chris ++++++ HISTORIES OF COMPUTING IN ASIA 4 TO 8 DECEMBER 2020 SOUTH CHINA UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY GUANGZHOU The next meeting of IFIP’s Working Group 9.7 will be hosted by the South China University of Technology (SCUT) in Guangzhou, China, from 4 to 8 December 2020. This workshop will bring together international and Chinese academic researchers, public historians, and industry professionals who are interested in the history of computing. THEMES The theme of conference will be histories of computing in Asia, with a particular emphasis on contextualizing China’s success in computing. The program committee will consider any paper in line with this theme, but we are particularly interested in topics such as: 1. China, Asia, and Beyond. The rapid rise of Chinese computing: * electronic computing and the three phases of Chinese manufacturing: introduction, digestion, re-innovation * computing innovations by Chinese professionals, both within the PRC and by overseas Chinese in other countries * antecedents to business models like the sharing economy, e-payments, and online shopping that led to success for Alibaba, Tencent, and others * computing in the Asian republics of the former USSR (such as Kazakhstan) 2. Internationalism. Frameworks that foster multinational cooperation and innovation: * computing on the silk road, and along the modern belt and road * standards, protocols, and diplomacy * machine translation, global English, and language plurality 3. Science and Technology Studies. History and philosophy of technology, from east to west: * theoretical and ideological responses to computing * case studies of equitable technological development * insights from feminist, masculinity, and gender studies * linguistic analysis in the history of computing, computing’s contributions to linguistics 4. Pedagogy. Teaching the history of computing in or about Asia to: * engineering students * business, humanities, and social science students * high school students * employees or the general public 5. Public History and Imagination. Remembering and presenting histories of computing: * images of computing in literature, film, and television * computing in/with/for the arts and humanities * preserving and presenting the history of computing inside and outside of Asia REVIEW PROCESS Academic and amateur historians, computing and informatics professionals, archivists, and museum curators are welcome to submit papers for this workshop. Following our typical practice, we will ask for full papers for anonymous peer review by a program committee. If you would like preliminary feedback on the suitability of your project, you may submit an extended abstract in advance. Use the form at http://ifipwg97.org/workshops/hca2020/<https://nam02.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fifipwg97.o…> to receive additional instructions. Accepted papers must be revised according to the comments of the peer reviewers. In order to provide for a lively discussion at the workshop, we will distribute draft papers to participants in advance. After the workshop, authors will have the chance to incorporate feedback from the audience before submitting their final papers for consideration of the edited volume of selected papers for the proceedings volume. The official language of the workshop and the printed proceedings is English. IMPORTANT DATES * 22 March 2020: Deadline for optional review of extended abstracts (1000–2000 words and bibliography) for review by the Program Committee * 1 May 2020: Draft paper submissions open on workshop website * 1 June 2020: Deadline to submit draft papers for consideration by Program Committee * 1 September 2020: Comments from Program Committee, decisions, and invitations sent to authors * 4 November 2020: Collection of papers, revised based on reviewer comments using Springer template, for distribution to workshop participants * 4 December 2020: Participants arrive in Guangzhou, China * 13 January 2021: Revised papers due for consideration in proceedings volume For instructions on how to submit your extended abstract or draft paper, please fill out the form at http://ifipwg97.org/workshops/hca2020/<https://nam02.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fifipwg97.o…> Enquires in advance of your submission may be addressed to the chair of the working group, Christopher Leslie, at <chrisleslienyc(a)hotmail.com<mailto:chrisleslienyc@hotmail.com>>. ORGANIZER The International Federation of Information Technology (IFIP), established in 1960, consists of fourteen technical committees (TCs) dedicated to information and communication technologies and sciences. Most are technical in nature. Technical Committee 9 (TC 9), however, is dedicated to the intersection of information communication technology (ICT) and society. Working Group 9.7 focuses on the history of computing and seeks to support effective teaching, academic research, and public histories. History of computing is a broad term that can include such topics as pre-digital (analog) computers. For more information and a list of our previous workshops, see our website: http://ifipwg97.org/<https://nam02.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fifipwg97.o…> VENUE SCUT (https://www.scut.edu.cn/en/<https://nam02.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.scut.…>) is a comprehensive research university with a specialization in engineering. Located in China’s third-largest city, the university is easily accessible by Baiyun International Airport as well as high-speed rail. As a major transportation hub, Guangzhou is less than two hours away by train from Shenzhen, Hong Kong, and Macau. It is also less than three hours away by airplane from many cities in the region, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Hanoi, Bangkok, Taipei, Manila. Guangzhou is capital of Guangdong province, which is famous for the many emigrants who brought Chinese culture to the rest of the world, and visitors can enjoy learning about 2,500 years of history here. Guangdong province is also the tech capital of China, where many internet and new media companies (such as Tencent) are located. In this way, Guangzhou offers visitors a glimpse into China’s future as well as its past. --- Christopher Leslie Chair, IFIP Working Group 9.7: History of Computing Lecturer, South China University of Technology

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2019 BSHS Ayrton Prize for digital engagement: nominations open
by James Sumner 04 Jan '20

04 Jan '20

Of likely interest to some listmembers... JS The British Society for the History of Science’s Outreach and Engagement Committee <https://www.bshs.org.uk/category/outreach-and-education> is delighted to invite nominations to the *BSHS Ayrton Prize 2019.* This prize is awarded once every two years to recognise outstanding digital engagement in the history of science, technology and medicine (HSTM). We interpret the term “digital engagement” broadly to include: •publicly accessible websites, or clearly defined contributions to existing web-based projects •podcasts and audio or video projects created for online delivery •online forums for public dialogue and discussion •social media initiatives (the nomination should be for a well-defined and publicly identifiable campaign or series of activities, rather than a general engagement presence) •smartphone apps •citizen science-style public engagement projects delivered online •virtual/augmented reality environments •simulations and models based on historical sources or data •projects using digital methods to make source materials more accessible to a wider audience (for example, 3D imaging of historical objects) •research projects which apply digital humanities approaches to HSTM sources or metadata, provided they have a public engagement element •digital tools and utilities to aid the work of public engagement professionals. If you are interested in nominating a project which seems to fall outside these categories, please contact the organisers for clarification. To be eligible, entries should •have been created or updated with substantial new content within the last two years •directly or indirectly support engagement or dialogue between specialists in the HSTM community and non-specialists •Reflect current best practice in both HSTM and digital engagement. *Judging* The projects will be evaluated using the following criteria: •Does the project reflect current scholarship in HSTM? •Does the project display good digital design principles? Is it easily navigable and accessible? •Is it innovative in its technical and/or scholarly approach? •Does it make effective use of the medium? •Is the content accurate and, where appropriate, supported by appropriate references to scholarly sources or further material? •Is it useful to HSTM practitioners and/or is it informative and interesting to public audiences? •Are there clear and feasible plans to secure the longer-term future of the project? *Entering* Nominations should come from representatives of the projects themselves. If you feel that a project you did not work on directly should be nominated, please encourage the project developers/managers to apply. Entrants should complete the short form available at https://www.bshs.org.uk/ayrton-prize-2019-nominations-open and send it to ayrton(a)bshs.org.uk <mailto:ayrton@bshs.org.uk>. All queries should also be sent to this address. The closing date for entries is *Monday 6 January 2020.*

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Histories of Computing in Asia: First Call for Papers
by Christopher Leslie 04 Jan '20

04 Jan '20

Dear Colleagues, I am pleased to announce that the next IFIP Working Group 9.7 workshop will be held in China at the end of the year. If you’re interested in submitting a paper, attending the workshop, or volunteering as a peer reviewer, let us know at http://ifipwg97.org/workshops/hca2020/ <http://ifipwg97.org/workshops/hca2020/> Please feel free to forward this announcement. Sincerely, Chris Leslie ++++++ HISTORIES OF COMPUTING IN ASIA 4 TO 8 DECEMBER 2020 SOUTH CHINA UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY GUANGZHOU The next meeting of IFIP’s Working Group 9.7 will be hosted by the South China University of Technology (SCUT) in Guangzhou, China, from 4 to 8 December 2020. This workshop will bring together international and Chinese academic researchers, public historians, and industry professionals who are interested in the history of computing. THEMES The theme of conference will be histories of computing in Asia, with a particular emphasis on contextualizing China’s success in computing. The program committee will consider any paper in line with this theme, but we are particularly interested in topics such as: China, Asia, and Beyond. The rapid rise of Chinese computing: electronic computing and the three phases of Chinese manufacturing: introduction, digestion, re-innovation computing innovations by Chinese professionals, both within the PRC and by overseas Chinese in other countries antecedents to business models like the sharing economy, e-payments, and online shopping that led to success for Alibaba, Tencent, and others computing in the Asian republics of the former USSR (such as Kazakhstan) Internationalism. Frameworks that foster multinational cooperation and innovation: computing on the silk road, and along the modern belt and road standards, protocols, and diplomacy machine translation, global English, and language plurality Science and Technology Studies. History and philosophy of technology, from east to west: theoretical and ideological responses to computing case studies of equitable technological development insights from feminist, masculinity, and gender studies linguistic analysis in the history of computing, computing’s contributions to linguistics Pedagogy. Teaching the history of computing in or about Asia to: engineering students business, humanities, and social science students high school students employees or the general public Public History and Imagination. Remembering and presenting histories of computing: images of computing in literature, film, and television computing in/with/for the arts and humanities preserving and presenting the history of computing inside and outside of Asia REVIEW PROCESS Academic and amateur historians, computing and informatics professionals, archivists, and museum curators are welcome to submit papers for this workshop. Following our typical practice, we will ask for full papers for anonymous peer review by a program committee. If you would like preliminary feedback on the suitability of your project, you may submit an extended abstract in advance. Use the form at http://ifipwg97.org/workshops/hca2020/ <http://ifipwg97.org/workshops/hca2020/> to receive additional instructions. Accepted papers must be revised according to the comments of the peer reviewers. In order to provide for a lively discussion at the workshop, we will distribute draft papers to participants in advance. After the workshop, authors will have the chance to incorporate feedback from the audience before submitting their final papers for consideration of the edited volume of selected papers for the proceedings volume. The official language of the workshop and the printed proceedings is English. IMPORTANT DATES 22 March 2020: Deadline for optional review of extended abstracts (1000–2000 words and bibliography) for review by the Program Committee 1 May 2020: Draft paper submissions open on workshop website 1 June 2020: Deadline to submit draft papers for consideration by Program Committee 1 September 2020: Comments from Program Committee, decisions, and invitations sent to authors 4 November 2020: Collection of papers, revised based on reviewer comments using Springer template, for distribution to workshop participants 4 December 2020: Participants arrive in Guangzhou, China 13 January 2021: Revised papers due for consideration in proceedings volume For instructions on how to submit your extended abstract or draft paper, please fill out the form at http://ifipwg97.org/workshops/hca2020/ <http://ifipwg97.org/workshops/hca2020/> Enquires in advance of your submission may be addressed to the chair of the working group, Christopher Leslie, at <chrisleslienyc(a)hotmail.com <mailto:chrisleslienyc@hotmail.com>>. ORGANIZER The International Federation of Information Technology (IFIP), established in 1960, consists of fourteen technical committees (TCs) dedicated to information and communication technologies and sciences. Most are technical in nature. Technical Committee 9 (TC 9), however, is dedicated to the intersection of information communication technology (ICT) and society. Working Group 9.7 focuses on the history of computing and seeks to support effective teaching, academic research, and public histories. History of computing is a broad term that can include such topics as pre-digital (analog) computers. For more information and a list of our previous workshops, see our website: http://ifipwg97.org/ <http://ifipwg97.org/> VENUE SCUT (https://www.scut.edu.cn/en/ <https://www.scut.edu.cn/en/>) is a comprehensive research university with a specialization in engineering. Located in China’s third-largest city, the university is easily accessible by Baiyun International Airport as well as high-speed rail. As a major transportation hub, Guangzhou is less than two hours away by train from Shenzhen, Hong Kong, and Macau. It is also less than three hours away by airplane from many cities in the region, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu, Hanoi, Bangkok, Taipei, Manila. Guangzhou is capital of Guangdong province, which is famous for the many emigrants who brought Chinese culture to the rest of the world, and visitors can enjoy learning about 2,500 years of history here. Guangdong province is also the tech capital of China, where many internet and new media companies (such as Tencent) are located. In this way, Guangzhou offers visitors a glimpse into China’s future as well as its past. --- Christopher Leslie Chair, IFIP Working Group 9.7: History of Computing Lecturer, South China University of Technology

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AHA 2020 — NYC
by Mar Hicks 03 Jan '20

03 Jan '20

Hi all, Just curious who on the list is going to be in NYC for the American Historical Association conference this weekend? Best, Mar ______________________ Mar Hicks Associate Professor History of Technology Illinois Institute of Technology Chicago, IL USA mhicks1(a)iit.edu | marhicks.com | @histoftech Programmed Inequality: How Britain Discarded Women Technologists and Lost Its Edge in Computing www.programmedinequality.com

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