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1	Practically Human. : Performing Social Robots and Feminist Aspects on Agency, Body and Gender. Victorin, Karin January 2019 (has links) Through an experimental theatre play, this thesis explores the development of human-like agency in contemporary “social robot” technology. The entrance point of this study is the gender gap and lack of diversity in contemporary AI/robot development, with an emerging need for interdisciplinary research across robot technology and social sciences. Using feminist technoscience and critical posthumanism as the theoretical framework, this research involves an analysis of a particular social robot case, currently being developed at Furhat Robotics in Stockholm. Inspired by Judy Wajcman (2004), I analyze how socially intelligent machines impact perceptions of human agency, body, gender, and identity within cultural contexts and through interaction. The first part of the empirical research is carried out in the robot-lab. The robot is then, in the second part, invited to perform as an actor in a theatre play. Entangled amidst the other players and audience members, a queered agency starts to reveal itself through human-machine “intra-action” and embodiment (Barad 2003). Human-like agency in machines is shown to be a complex matter, drawing the conclusion that human-beings are vulnerable to a myriad of entanglements and preconceptions that artificial intelligence potentially embodies. Social Sciences Samhällsvetenskap
2	Articulations of Liberation and Agency in Yanagi Miwa's "Elevator Girls" Chamberlain, Rachel P 02 May 2012 (has links) Miwa Yanagi’s Elevator Girls series, a collection of glossy photographs featuring groups of similarly clad women lingering in expansive, empty arcades, made its international debut in 1996. While the pieces garnered positive reactions, Yanagi found that most Western viewers read her work as predominantly “Oriental”—confirming stereotypes of a highly polished techno-topic Japan that was still negotiating gender equality. In this thesis, I explore alternative ways of reading Yanagi’s Elevator Girls series, which, I argue, call attention to myopic views of commercialism and identity in order to provide an alternative reading of these women as agents of transgression and ideological transcendence. Whereas many viewed Yanagi’s works as a comment on capitalist machinations, where consumerism has produced soulless, vapid feminine identities, I focus on the ways in which these women exercise agency without relying on notions of an individualized, unique ego. Yanagi Miwa Japanese contemporary art Consumerism Elevator Girls Globalization Late-capitalism Orientalism International art market Buddhism Hybridity Space Place Identity Ma Department store Self Kami Artistic nationalism Liminal personae

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Practically Human. : Performing Social Robots and Feminist Aspects on Agency, Body and Gender.

Articulations of Liberation and Agency in Yanagi Miwa's "Elevator Girls"