Ada Palmer is a University of Chicago Renaissance historian (and so much more: librettist, science fiction novelist, and all-round polymath); she has convened a series of seminars at the University in collaboration with science and piracy historian Adrian Johns, and me!
We’re exploring the parallels between the censorship systems that sprang up at the advent of the printing press and the information control battles we’ve seen since the dawn of the internet.
The first session (“Introduction, Censorship & Information Control During Information Revolutions”) is tomorrow, hosted by the three of us. It runs from 1:20CST to 4:20CST. You can attend in person for free on nthe University of Chicago Campus, in Kent Chemical Laboratory (1020-24 East 58th Street, 60637) room 107.
It’s being recorded and there will be high-quality, accessible video recordings (courtesy of the Kickstarter backers) up shortly after the session.
October 5th: Introduction, Censorship & Information Control During Information Revolutions
This week our three co-organizers will introduce the questions of the series. Are there patterns in how revolutions in information technology stimulate new forms of information control? What can earlier information revolutions teach us about the digital revolution? How do real historical cases of censorship tend to differ from the centralized, well-planned censorship that Orwell’s 1984 teaches us to expect? How can forms of information control which were not intended as censorship have similar consequences to censorship, with or without human agency?
* Adrian Johns (printing history, history of copyright, radio, piracy)
* Ada Palmer (Inquisition, pre-modern European censorship, censorship of comic books)
* Cory Doctorow (digital information policy) will join this week by teleconference.
Censorship and Information Control During Information Revolutions [University of Chicago]