DISCO Network DISCO Summit 2024 Day 1
Day 1: Friday, June 14, 2024
9:00 am - 10:15 am
Digital Optimism with Lisa Nakamura, Rayvon Fouché, Stephanie Dinkins, André Brock, Remi Yergeau, and Catherine Knight Steele
Optimism is the belief that the interval between the now and liberation is where we can act. Digital optimism is the recognition that there are elements of life that vivify and energize in the here and the now, despite and amidst the digital purgatories that we endure. Sometimes that energy is found in stillness; sometimes in refusal; and sometimes in moments of catharsis or joy. This panel will explore the concept of digital optimism as it appears in DISCO’s collaborative writing and work together.
10:30 am - 11:45 am
Digital Frictions with Remi Yergeau, David Adelman, Jeff Nagy, Aimi Hamraie, Jaipreet Virdi, and Mara Mills
In their manifesto on crip technoscience, Kelly Fritsch and Aimi Hamraie (2019) impress upon us that access production is a “frictional process,” one that requires “acknowledging that science and technology can be used to both produce and dismantle injustice.” This roundtable explores the frictional intimacies, practices, and material conditions of what it means to do the digital. In particular, panelists will consider myriad ways in which accessibility holds the potential to burn, grate, spark, and tug at new imaginings of crip futures.
1:00 pm - 2:15 pm
Digital Black Feminist Pleasure and Pain Online with Catherine Knight Steele, Rianna Walcott, Francesca Sobande, and Kishonna Gray
The experiences of Black women online serve as a harbinger of what digital culture affords and what is to come. This panel thinks through the relationship between pleasure and pain in the online lives of Black women and how Black feminist methods, epistemologies, and strategies may point us toward a better digital future for us all.
2:30 pm - 3:45 pm
Little Memes: Storying Race, Gender, and Disability in the Digital Studies Classroom with Remi Yergeau, Huan He, and Toni Bushner
How do students’ stories about themselves or others—their anecdotal relations—inform their burgeoning understandings of digital inequality and related concepts? In this session, we reflect on student interviews and instructor experiences drawn from a study of five U-M Digital Studies classes focused on race and disability.
4:00 pm - 5:15 pm
Black Digital Optimism in an Age of Despair with André Brock, Kevin Winstead, Brandy Pettijohn, Apryl Williams, and Ngozi Harrison
This panel will discuss what social media activity looks like for Black folk at a time when economic disparity, geopolitical extremism, and the ongoing pandemic loom behind every post, tweet, video, and podcast.
The DISCO Summit is a two-day interdisciplinary summer symposium about digital social inequalities in celebration of the third year of the DISCO Network. The DISCO Summit will include nine panel conversations about the past, present, and future of the intersection between digital technology, culture, race, disability, gender, sexuality, and liberation.
The DISCO Network is a collaborative, intergenerational group of scholars dedicated to envisioning a new anti-racist and anti-ableist digital future. The DISCO Network comprises six labs across five universities: the Michigan Hub at the University of Michigan Digital Studies Institute (PI: Lisa Nakamura, University of Michigan), HAT Lab (PI: Rayvon Fouché; Northwestern University), DAF Lab (PI: M. Remi Yergeau, University of Michigan), Future Histories Studio (PI: Stephanie Dinkins, Stony Brook University), PREACH Lab (André Brock, Georgia Institute of Technology), and BCaT Lab (Catherine Knight Steele, University of Maryland-College Park). The DISCO Network is supported by the Mellon Foundation.
This event is free and open to the public. The DISCO Summit provides a platform for scholars, students, artists, practitioners, activists, and community members to convene and engage in dialogue about racial inequality, histories of exclusion, disability justice, techno-ableism, and digital racial politics within the academy, the technology industry, and beyond. We especially welcome individuals whose interests lie in the intersection of the digital and identity and have found difficulties pursuing their endeavors at their home institutions.
Registration is required to attend the DISCO Summit:
The deadline for in-person registration is Tuesday, May 14, 2024. Due to limited space in the venue, in-person registration will close once we reach our maximum capacity. Register to attend in-person: https://myumi.ch/MrQwg
The deadline for Zoom webinar registration is Wednesday, June 13, 2024. Register to attend via Zoom: https://myumi.ch/N61QZ
Accessibility statement: We strive to make our events accessible to all participants.
- All attendees are requested to wear well-fitting masks. Masks will be provided at the event space.
- Communication Access Real-time Translation (CART) services will be provided.
- The event space is ADA-compliant.
- Gender-neutral and accessible restrooms are available in the event space.
- A quiet space will be available.
- The event planning team has worked to mitigate potential sensory triggers, such as loud buzzing sounds or flickering lights, in the event space. Individuals with sensory sensitivities should be aware that there is a possibility of unpredictable sound or lighting changes during the event.
- All attendees are requested to refrain from using scented products, such as perfume or cologne. Unscented products (e.g., soap, hand sanitizer) will be provided at the event space.
- A digital copy of the event program will be made available at least a week prior to the event.
- For those who are unable to attend the event in-person, a livestream viewing option is available.
- More detailed information about the event space (including how to access it and how the space will be arranged) will be made available on our website.
- If there are additional ways that we can meet your access needs, please indicate this in the registration form. Please register as soon as possible as some accommodations may require advance coordination.
For all inquiries related to the DISCO Summit, please contact Cherice Chan, DISCO Network Program Coordinator, at chericec@umich.edu.
