in.frastructu.re

Media Theories of Infrastructure

MA Media Theory Seminar, Group 5

Wednesdays 09:00–11:45, 4 Nov – 9 Dec 2026

OMHP E0.12

Zachary Furste, z.a.furste@uva.nl

Description

Scholars in media studies and allied disciplines have described an “infrastructural turn,” evident in the last decades' theoretical research into undersea fiberoptic cables, data centers, 5G towers, recommendation algorithms, and lithium mines. An interest in the operations and logistics of such “media backends” has complemented, if not entirely displaced, previous theories of screens and interfaces, which themselves supplanted an earlier generation’s ideological critiques of the image and deconstructions of media representations.

Where does media theory stand now in relationship to infrastructure? What unique contributions can media scholars make to discussions of infrastructure compared to perspectives from fields like sociology, geography, or science and technology studies? How does an infrastructural focus on scale, circulation, and containment connect to recent developments in media theory like elemental, environmental, or geo-media? What, on the other hand, falls out of view when we follow this turn? How might a conceptual focus on media infrastructure inform methodological innovation in artistic research or critical technical practice?

To engage these questions in this tutorial, we’ll read texts by theorists associated with the recent ‘turn’ such as John Durham Peters, Lisa Parks, Nicole Starosielski, Rahul Mukherjee, Tung-Hui Hu, and Ranjodh Singh Dhaliwal, as well as conceptual forerunners like Susan Leigh Star, Friedrich Kittler, Bruno Latour, and Isabelle Stengers.

Alongside readings, we will survey infrastructure-oriented creative projects by Ingrid Burrington, Kate Crawford and Vladan Joler, Eva & Franco Mattes, Trevor Paglen, and JODI, as well as practical interventions around home servers, shadow archives, and permacomputing. Throughout, we’ll consider how attending to the wires, pipes, servers, and supply chains of infrastructure equips us to think differently about media.

As in all Media Theory Seminars, the focus is on building a theoretical framework and applying it to a case. The final paper is a test run for the MA thesis.

Learning objectives

These follow the five MTS objectives and add one specific to this seminar. By the end of the seminar, students will be able to:

  1. Critically compare theories of media infrastructure, from Star and Kittler to the elemental and environmental turns.
  2. Problematize an infrastructural phenomenon conceptually and frame a research question in conversation with the literature.
  3. Approach a topic systematically by moving from object to concept to case.
  4. Develop an academic argument in a 3,000-word research paper.
  5. Apply knowledge of the field’s key debates: visibility and invisibility, scale, materiality and abstraction, maintenance and repair.
  6. Seminar-specific: assess creative and technical interventions (artworks, home servers, shadow archives, permacomputing) as forms of infrastructural knowledge.

Schedule and readings

The seminar moves from the infrastructural turn (weeks 1–3) to the 1-on-1 paper presentations (week 4). It then asks what lies beyond the turn (week 5) and ends with interventions (week 6). Readings are a first draft; citations are marked to check before posting to Canvas.

Week 1 — The infrastructural turn (4 Nov)

What made infrastructure a media-theoretical object, and what did it inherit from STS and anthropology?

Week 2 — Elemental and environmental media (11 Nov)

What happens when media are understood as environments, and environments as media?

Week 3 — Clouds, code, abstraction (18 Nov)

Can theories of material infrastructure account for software, virtualization and the abstractions computing is built on?

Week 4 — 1-on-1 paper presentations (25 Nov)

There is no seminar or reading this week. Each student presents their paper plan in a short individual slot during the 09:00–11:45 block, and the presentation replaces the written research proposal (see Assessment). A sign-up sheet for slots goes up after week 2.

Week 5 — Beyond the infrastructural? (2 Dec)

Is the operative, logistical and material the only game in town? Forerunners and alternatives to the turn.

Week 6 — Interventions: art and critical technical practice (9 Dec)

What do artworks and do-it-yourself infrastructures know that theory doesn’t? In class we survey works by Ingrid Burrington, Crawford and Joler, Eva & Franco Mattes, Trevor Paglen and JODI. We also look at home servers, shadow archives and permacomputing.

Assessment

There are three components: five weekly assignments (complete/incomplete, at least 4 of 5 complete), the 1-on-1 paper presentation (20%) and the research paper (80%). To pass, students need 4 of 5 assignments complete and at least 5.5 on both graded components.

Weekly assignments

Each assignment is 500–700 words and goes on Canvas by Monday 17:00 before class.

Each one ends with at least one reading question on a required text for the coming week, which the student brings to discussion.

1-on-1 paper presentation (week 4, 25 Nov) — 20%

The presentation replaces the 500-word written proposal. It is graded 1–10 on the manual’s four proposal criteria: research topic, relevant literature, research question and case study.

Research paper — 80%

The paper is 3,000 words ±10%, excluding references, and is graded on the manual’s criteria: critical engagement with the literature, argumentation, structure and presentation. It should engage substantially with at least two seminar readings. Deadline TBC.

The course manual’s rules on fraud, plagiarism and generative AI apply.