Organized by Bernadette Wegenstein and the CAMS 2011-2012 fellows (Amrita Ibrahim,Angelika Rothhardt, and Johannes Schade)

March 13-14 2012 Gilman 50 & Mason Hall, The Johns Hopkins University

The DIGITAL CAPITAL symposium will bring the following pressing questions to the table: what is the economic model of digital capital? How does digital capital impact our social environments and habits-for instance, is facebook a playground or a factory? Is digital capital a means of strengthening the 1% or connecting the under-represented with such DIY engagements as crowd-funding? How does digital capital impact the way we visualize communication (digital aesthetics), the way we promote and negotiate identity (twitter, reddit, tumblr.), and the very phenomenology of human interactions (e.g., smodcasting)? Will a digitally-driven television that follows the logic of individualized, downloadable programming through VOD aggregators constitute an end to the idea of “tele-vision,” a medium that created the mythical opportunity of “seeing from afar” (German fernsehen), and of extending our own (culturally bound) vision? Finally, what new legalities are implied by digital capital, if users have the choice to access digital programming via subscription to digital distribution platforms, and are no longer bound to the idea of a pre-set programming that frames their media consumption?

For more information go to: http://web1.johnshopkins.edu/digitalcapital/info.php

Pre-order The Cosmetic Gaze

Bernadette Wegenstein is giving an artist talk in Jimmy Joe Roche’s class on Baltimore Filmmakers March 7, 4:30-5:30pm in Gilman 75.

Nicholas Mirzoeff, Professor of Media, Culture and Communication at New York University, comments on the Living Book Series from the Open Humanities Press: ‘This remarkable series transforms the humble Reader into a living form, while breaking down the conceptual barrier between the humanities and the sciences in a time when scholars and activists of all kinds have taken the understanding of life to be central. Brilliant in its simplicity and concept, this series is a leap towards an exciting new future.’

COSMETIC SURGERY: MEDICINE, CULTURE, BEAUTY

Bernadette Wegenstein received a Tech Fellowship from JHU’s Center for Educational Resources to develop the project: Breast-cancer: New and Old Images; Tech fellow is Johannes Schade.

Project Description:

In my upcoming undergraduate class “Breast-cancer: a cultural-theoretical approach to an illness and its meaning” in Fall 2011, I will explore the history of the breast as symbol of sex and life, along with the cancer that affects it, not merely as a medical condition, but as a powerful symbol in culture, art, and literature. As a starting point, I would like to launch a web-based research environment for my class that includes an image database showcasing the progression of breast cancer in the cultural and medical imaginary: from the paralyzing and disfiguring removal of the breast in the “radical mastectomy” (invented at Johns Hopkins University by William Stewart Halsted in the 1890s) to today’s skin and nipple-sparing mastectomies that are often performed in conjunction with a beauty operation such as breast-augmentation, or bonus operation such as a “mommy-tuck.” In a second step I will develop a virtual, character-driven gaming environment, where student-players can experience the decision-making process resulting from a diagnose with breast-cancer: from DNA tests, to the decisions about the various degrees of surgical intervention (lumpectomies/mastectomies), to the reconstructive technologies of plastic surgery and other makeover strategies that reconstitute a new body and body image. This virtual experience will be mapped out in 2-3 game scenarios such as an office visit, a conversation between a doctor/nurse and a patient, a surgery, an “outing” experience (e.g., a breast cancer run), and other cultural phenomena occurring in relation to the illness. The idea behind this environment is to give students a sense of the landscape of breast-cancer from a cultural point of view. With the help of an image-database and some game scenarios students will experience and understand why the breast is a sign and site where Western culture believes life as such to be situated.

Technologies of Meaning conference at Hopkins on March 4-5, 2011

Curated by Bernadette Wegenstein and Jeroen Gerrits

The conference will deal with the question of old/new media technologies, their applications in our lives, as well as with the fate of their meaning.