Science, Technology, and Media Studies
Seminar on Media Studies
In a society where media are increasingly shaped by software and AI, new scientific approaches are needed to address emerging technologies and the ways in which they are appropriated. Science and Technology Studies (STS) analyze current media phenomena and trace them back to fundamental socio-technical structures. In this way, the professorship serves as an interface for media research in the cultural and social sciences. STS focuses on representations and inscriptions of media, as well as on the reciprocal construction of technologies and practices. In this way, STS broadens the scope of media studies and, above all, strengthens methodological pluralism—for networked and mobile media require networked and mobile research methods.
Current Research Projects
Research Project A03 within the SFB “Media of Cooperation” is dedicated to the media-theoretical question of how media and spaces are cooperatively produced through navigational practices. After A03 addressed the transformation of navigation applications into social media and platforms during the first phase, the second funding phase focused on semi-autonomous navigation processes. In the third funding phase, the subproject investigates decision-intensive, media-supported navigation situations in urban spaces characterized by sensor-rich infrastructure. In the literature on the “Internet of Things,” this mode of mobility is also described as context-based micronavigation. Micronavigation is defined here as a form of movement characterized by shared data, media, and spatial practices, in which media and modes of transport are used for relatively short periods or switched frequently. The goal of this subproject is to analyze and theoretically describe the collaborative construction of data, media, and spatial practices in micronavigation across both online and offline worlds.
This research project examines collaborative processes of semi-autonomization in the field of precision farming—based on sensor technologies—from the perspectives of media theory, media history, and media praxeology. Against the backdrop of current sociopolitical and ecological challenges in the agricultural sector, this SFB subproject uses the example of digital herding to evaluate how cooperative media practices among heterogeneous actors give rise to virtual geographical boundaries. To this end, a cooperation analysis is used to examine terrain-modeling boundary practices, their usage-specific forms of media interaction, and their implementation asclosed-loop sensing. The project thus enables a reflection on the media-related conditions and scope for action within an agriculture-specific practice that consolidates developments in media history and, at the same time, exerts a lasting influence on future developments in the fields of agriculture and livestock farming.
In order to fully grasp the interwoven media-studies topic of boundary objects and boundary practices, media-theoretical reflection, empirical-qualitative field research, and a historical-praxeological examination of its development are all necessary. The aim is to make comprehensible the current media and data practices of sensor-based digital fencing as an emergent further development of previous analog techniques of terrain modeling, as well as of media and boundary practices related to fencing. To this end, the characteristics of virtual fencing identified as essential are subjected to a historical analysis that also takes into account the agricultural, praxeological, and sociotechnical implications of mobile fencing.
Article from
future – the research magazine of the University of Siegen.
Director: Dr. Johannes Schick
Funded by the Volkswagen Foundation from 2026 to 2030
Technology is considered the defining characteristic of humanity and the 21st century. It is viewed as both a curse and a blessing, and recently, scholars across the sciences have argued that humanity and technology are fatefully linked for better or for worse. Consequently, research has turned its attention inward to understand humanity’s technical capabilities and has increasingly examined processes at the species or evolutionary level. ZOOGESTURES counters this by arguing that, as a result, the interaction of heterogeneous living beings has been overlooked as a potential key context for technological innovation, learning, and innovation. The project brings together an interdisciplinary research group drawing on the philosophy and anthropology of technology, archaeology, and primatology to develop the theoretical and methodological resources needed to trace the role of other, non-human animals in the evolution of human technology. We pursue the hypothesis that non-human technical gestures are important sources of human learning, embodied behavior, and environmental adaptation. Through the analysis of archaeological finds and indigenous traditions, we seek to identify historical indicators, examples, and material correlates for our hypothesis. We also conduct primatological field research with wild primates in Africa to investigate the extent to which their attention is directed toward the gestures and behavior of other living beings.
