Events Archive

2026-2027 Events

  • Event poster for “Is AI inevitable?” with large blue and yellow irregular shapes displaying the event title.

    Is AI Inevitable? Insight from Hypecel vs. Technoskepticist Perspectives

    DISCO Network | University of Michigan

    November 5, 2026

    Stories about artificial intelligence often imagine the future as inevitable: AI will transform our jobs, reshape our relationships, and increasingly make decisions once left to people. But what happens if we refuse to treat that future as already decided? This panel will discuss two contrasting personas for thinking about generative AI: “hypecels,” who embrace AI’s promises so enthusiastically that technological change can appear unstoppable, and “technoskepticists,”who question the larger social, political, and cultural interest AI serves. Ultimately, we aim to think critically about AI not simply as a collection of powerful new tools, but as part of a much larger struggle over who gets to imagine, build, and control the future.

  • Event poster for “Refuse, Resist, Repair: Making Critical Moves in the Times of AI” with abstract squares and a grid.

    Refuse, Resist, Repair: Making Critical Moves in the Times of AI

    DISCO Network | University of Michigan

    October 9, 2026

    A.I. is inevitable-- at least that is what we would be led to believe from the nonstop media coverage, podcast interviews with tech billionaires, and the advertisements interspersed in our TikTok and Reels doomscrolling sessions. But what does it mean to bring a critical eye to Generative A.I.? Why should the average person care about how their data is used to fuel these systems? Who does the labor that makes them work? And what impact will this push to incorporate A.I. in the classroom, healthcare, politics, and pop culture have on us as a society and on our environment? This panel considers three possibilities: refusal, resistance, and repair as responses to A.I.'s creep into our daily lives.

  • Flyer for "Feeling the Future: Asian/Americanist Takes on Techno-Empire, Chinamaxxing, & the “American Century of Humiliation”" featuring illustrated pagodas.

    Feeling the Future: Asian/Americanist Takes on Techno-Empire, Chinamaxxing, & the “American Century of Humiliation”

    DISCO Network | University of Michigan

    September 23, 2026

    "You've met me at a very Chinese time in my life." American social media users and influencers like Hasan Piker, I Show Speed, and Kris Jenner have become newly interested in China as a source of cultural and technological inspiration. This panel of experts in technology policy, Chinese techno-culture, and the interplay between the U.S. and Asia will discuss the roots of "Chinamaxxing" in U.S.-China relations. The panelists are members of the A.I.eeeee Collective and co-authors of a new book project called "Feeling the Future: Asian American Takes on Techno-Empire" which discusses Asian semiconductors, A.I., robots, and electric vehicles as sources of both envy and of resentment.