Humanities and Social Sciences in a Br-AI-ve New World

Experts predict that AI-based technologies will replace a significant number of workers in the near future. Today, algorithms already influence our daily lives in all dimensions – social, economic, political, legal. While critical discussions of algorithms and AI appear to be a current ‘hot topic’ among scholars from the humanities and social sciences, we have yet to come to terms with the present and pending implications of these technologies.

Dr. Zeller’s talk will reflect upon how humanities and social sciences can more actively engage research about and with emerging technology, framing this engagement through a novel approach to Snow’s Two Cultures in our ‘BrAIve New World.’ She will present theoretical ideas and study results from public engagement projects using a combined arts and sciences approach.

Dr. Frauke Zeller is Associate Professor in the School of Professional Communication at Ryerson University in Toronto, Canada. In her PhD theses, she developed a linguistic approach to Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) studies and conducted studies and experiments that focused on the communicative and linguistic dimensions in HRI. Together with Dr. Harris Smith she is the co-creator of hitchBOT, Canada’s first hitchhiking robot, and my kulturBOT. Dr. Zeller brings methodological expertise in big data analytics, predictive analytics, sentiment analysis, natural language processing and user studies. Dr. Zeller has been awarded a range of major research grants, among them a Marie Curie Fellowship, and is the Director of the Audience Research Lab at Ryerson University.