We are using “interrogation”, fittingly to the aims of the conference, in the way Oxford’s A Dictionary of Computing (2008)
defines the term. Interrogation in this sense is “the sending of a
signal that will initiate a response. A system may interrogate a
peripheral to see if it requires a data transfer. The response is
normally a status byte. When a number of devices are interrogated in a
sequence the process is called polling.” This International Conference,
therefore, is in a way sending “signals” to Derrida and the texts
associated to that proper name, especially Speech and Phenomena. We
want to investigate if these texts signal back and to what extent on
the questions of language, thinking, and writing that first animated
Derrida and which now need a serious revisit, reformulation, and
reconsiderations.
With the advances being made in AI and computing, we need a better
understanding of how these technologies are changing (or not changing)
how we understand language, thinking, and writing. This seems to be one
of the urgent tasks of philosophy and theory. The optimism of Hilary
Putnam (1995) that “AI has so far spun off a good deal that is of real
interest to computer science in general, but nothing that sheds any real
light on the mind” (392) to the Chinese Room Argument by John Searle
(1980) where he claims that “no program is sufficient for
intentionality” (424) have tried to wrest some ground of thinking from
computation and algorithm but the field remains highly contested and
contentious. Works such as Alien Phenomenology (2012) among
many others have shown interesting ways in which interactions and
thinking may happen within and between objects. Similarly, with natural
language processing (NLP) which enables a predictive model of writing
generating signifiers based on big data and algorithm the very notion of
“writing” is perhaps undergoing a radical change. If we take Derrida’s
claim that “writing thus comprehends language” (1976, 7) it is
now an urgent task to see if probabilistic writing is or is not
transforming the concept of writing all over again. Derrida’s task of
revealing the ethnocentrism that controlled the concept of writing which
was seen as “phoneticization of writing” (3) needs to be taken up in
the light of the promises and ambitions of “predictive writing.” If
Derrida indeed deconstructed the logocentric nature of ethnocentric
writing, does predictive writing “liberate” us finally from the
stranglehold of the logos? Is algorithmic also logocentric or is it not?
There are suggestions that it may just be the case and that what
Derrida and others were theorizing about language and writing may have
ultimately been triumphant (Underwood, 2023). This conference will think
about these questions deeply and hopefully will result in certain
insights which give us newer ways of conceptualizing thinking, language,
and writing.
This International Conference invites paper submissions from
scientists, media scholars, philosophers, literary scholars, Science and
Technology Studies (STS) scholars, historians, anthropologists,
practitioners, professionals, and others. The papers can have varied
perspectives and aims. They can be exploratory and speculative and could
also be based on empirical studies or lab results. The only requirement
is that the papers should be in conversation (or as we mentioned above,
in the nature of “interrogation”) with the range of concepts used by
Jacques Derrida that pertains to language, thinking, and writing. The
topics include but are not limited to:
- Deconstruction and AI
- Derrida and Ethics of Language and AI
- Derrida and Digital Humanities
- Derrida, Politics, and Social Media
- Derrida and AI generated Digital Selfs and Cultures
- Conversational AI and the Presence of Speech
- Trace in the Digital
Please send an abstract (500-750 words) with 3-5 keywords to mithilesh.kumar@christuniversity.in
Conveners:
Avirup Ghosh, Panihati Mahavidyalaya, Kolkata, India.
Mithilesh Kumar, CHRIST (Deemed to be University), Bengaluru, India.
Namitha Shivani Iyer, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK.
Abstracts will be selected through a double-blind review process. Papers presented at the conference will be published as a special issue in Tattva Journal of Philosophy (UGC-CARE Listed Journal. Group I, Arts and Humanities)
Important Dates and Fees:
- Deadline for submission of abstracts: September 30, 2023.
- Notification of selected abstracts: October 10, 2023
- Registration link: October 15, 2023.
- Deadline for registration: December 01, 2023.
Registration fee: Paper presenters (India)- INR 5,000
Paper Presenters (International)- US $75
Participation- INR 1,000 (India)/US $15 (International)
References:
Bogost, Ian. Alien Phenomenology, or, What It’s like to Be a Thing. University of Minnesota Press, 2012.
Daintith, John, et al., editors. A Dictionary of Computing. 6th ed, Oxford University Press, 2008.
Derrida, Jacques. Of Grammatology. Johns Hopkins University Press, 1976.
---. Speech and Phenomena, and Other Essays on Husserl’s Theory of Signs. Northwestern University Press, 1973.
---. Writing and Difference. University of Chicago Press, 1978.
---. Voice and Phenomenon: Introduction to the Problem of the Sign in Husserl’s Phenomenology. Northwestern University Press, 2011.
---. “What Is a ‘Relevant’ Translation?” Critical Inquiry, vol. 27, no. 2, Jan. 2001, pp. 174–200. DOI.org (Crossref), https://doi.org/10.1086/449005.
Pasquale, Frank. “The Algorithmic Self.” The Hedgehog Review, https://hedgehogreview.com/issues/too-much-information/articles/the-algorithmic-self. Accessed 7 Aug. 2023.
Putnam, Hilary, and James Conant. Words and Life. Harvard University Press, 1994.
Salmon, Peter. An Event, Perhaps: A Biography of Jacques Derrida. Verso, 2020.
Searle, John R. “Minds, Brains, and Programs.” Behavioral and Brain Sciences, vol. 3, no. 3, Sept. 1980, pp. 417–24. DOI.org (Crossref), https://doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X00005756.
