Rosi Braidotti, “Posthuman Knowledge”

This lecture is built on the assumption that we are currently situated in a posthuman convergence between the Fourth industrial Age and the Sixth Extinction, between and advanced knowledge economy, which perpetuates patterns of discrimination and exclusion, and the threat of climate change devastation for both human and non-human entities. This convergence calls for a posthuman critical intervention in the form of intersecting critiques of western humanism on the one hand and of anthropocentrism on the other. The lecture discusses the impact of this convergence upon three major areas: the constitution of our subjectivity; the general production of knowledge and the practice of the academic Humanities. It addresses directly the following questions: what are the implications of the fact that knowledge production is no longer the prerogative of academic or formal scientific institutions like the university ? What are we to make of the sudden growth of new trans-discipinary hubs that call themselves: the Environmental and Digital Humanities, the Medical, Neural and Bio-Humanities, and also the Public, Civic and Global Humanities and so on ? The lecture offers both a genealogy of these Critical Posthumanities and a theoretical framework by which to assess them. More information about Braidotti’s forthcoming book, Posthuman Knowledge can be found on the publisher’s website. See the GSD’s homepage for recently published a profile on Rosi. Rosi Braidotti (B.A. Hons. Australian National University, 1978; PhD, Université de Paris, Panthéon-Sorbonne, 1981; Honorary Degrees Helsinki, 2007 and Linkoping, 2013; Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities (FAHA), 2009; Member of the Academia Europaea (MAE), 2014; Knighthood in the order of the Netherlands Lion, 2005) is Distinguished University Professor at Utrecht University, founding Director of the Centre for the Humanities at Utrecht University (2007-2016), founding professor of Gender Studies in the Humanities at Utrecht University (1988-2005) and the first scientific director of the Netherlands Research School of Women’s Studies. Since 2009 she has been an elected board member of CHCI (Consortium of Humanities Centres and Institutes). Her publications include: Patterns of Dissonance, 1991; Metamorphoses, 2002; Transpositions, 2006; La philosophie, lá où on ne l’attend pas, 2009; Nomadic Subjects, 1994 and 2011a; Nomadic Theory, 2011b; The Posthuman, 2013. She recently co-edited Conflicting Humanities (2016) with Paul Gilroy and The Posthuman Glossary (2018) with Maria Hlavajova, which are part of the bookseries “Theory” she edits for Bloomsbury Academic. This lecture is co-organized by the Master in Design Studies Program and Womxn in Design.