Seminar.net

From Colonialism to Code

Nina Grünberger — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0200

There is currently a growing debate on the hegemonic power and ubiquity of IT monopolies and the implications of digital technologies in the context of education, especially media education. The debate is being conducted under the banner of digital capitalism and is mainly framed from the perspective of the Global North regarding the consequences of global developments for the 'West'. In the rare cases where a global, post- or decolonial perspective is adopted, social challenges such as inequalities are at the centre of the debate. These are framed in terms of the Global North exploiting the Global South through postcolonial dependencies, for example in the extraction of resources for technologies. This article goes beyond such perspectives. It outlines phenomena of digital capitalist power and domination in the context of education from a global, decolonizing perspective. The article primarily establishes a theoretical approach to the topic.

Knowledge Diversity at Universities?

Barbara Gross, Theo Hug, Ulrike Stadler-Altmann — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0200

In the last decade, debates on digitalization programs and on dynamics of datafication have become increasingly influential at universities. More recently, debates on the importance of artificial intelligence (AI) have begun, although corresponding questions about changing knowledge ecologies are currently underexplored in educational research. The processes of changing knowledge production are encountering relatively entrenched structures of knowledge organization and communication at universities, which are struggling to handle these new challenges. In this paper we use the historically-shaped university organization structures in three European countries as cases of analysis. Thus, first we give an overview of the concepts of knowledge ecology and knowledge diversity, followed by, second, a critical discussion of current trends in the digitalization and datafication of scientific knowledge production in education with examples from Italy, Austria and Germany, The choice of these different and highly complex scientific systems is justified by our experiences in these diverse contexts and corresponding academic affiliations. Third, we reflect on the implications of changing knowledge ecologies and knowledge diversity for the future of higher education.

Capitalism and Digital Inequality: Implications for Inclusive Education

Jan-René Schluchter, Anselm Böhmer — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0200

In recent decades, the deep interconnection between capitalism, digital media, and digital infrastructures has become increasingly evident. The capitalist utilization of digital media and technology brings profound social and socio-ecological impacts worldwide, including the worsening of social inequalities. Inclusion, understood as a guiding principle of social transformation, aims to address and reduce both social and digital inequalities. This approach demands ongoing reflection on the processes of social transformation in societies shaped by capitalist economies, particularly in educational settings. This article explores the links between capitalism in the digital age and social and digital inequality, with a specific focus on their implications for education.

The Relevance of the Frankfurt Triangle for Critical Media Literacy and Digital Citizenship

Petra Missomelius — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0200

The paper examines the ambivalence of digital capitalism, contrasting the economic dominance of big tech giants with the promise of diverse digital literacy experiences. Using digital citizenship education as a case study, the paper introduces the Frankfurt Triangle model, a framework that encourages a multi-perspective approach to the phenomena of digitality. This model broadens traditional technological perspectives by incorporating cultural, societal, and interactional aspects, aiming to address the lack of media-cultural, societal, and usage-related perspectives in educational discourses on digitality.

Educational approaches beyond digital capitalism

Valentin Dander — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0200

This article focuses on the question of how young people in different educational settings can be methodically and didactically motivated to deal with digital capitalism. To this end, theoretical perspectives on digital capitalism, the positionality of (capitalism-)critical (political media) education and its seemingly apparent self-evidence are problematised in the first step. Next, “Critical Data Literacies – a practice-based research project on digital capitalism” is outlined. Its aim was to develop educational methods for interrogating different aspects of digital capitalism by fostering critical-aesthetic data literacies. The proposed methods have been tested with youth, students and educational professionals in Germany. Empirical results from the accompanying qualitative research are presented here to generate perspectives for comparable project contexts and deepening research.

Contradictions of Progress

Christian Leineweber — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0200

The fact that the digital transformation of culture and society will influence the way people learn in the future has become a truism in education policy and society. The question of whether digital media belong in a contemporary pedagogical practice is undisputed – after all, digital media have long since become an integral part of the lives of children, young people and adults. In regard to digital ubiquity in our world, the aim of this article is to develop a critical position towards the capitalist tendencies of the digital. This perspective will be developed by the way of analysis of the inherent contradictions of individual and collective media practices.^[1]

[1] The following considerations are a thematically adapted translation of my article "Widersprüche des Fortschritts. Perspektiven einer medienpädagogischen Kapitalismuskritik" (cf. Leineweber, 2024a). I am grateful to guest editors Valentin Dander, Nina Grünberger, Theo Hug, Lilli Riettiens, and Rachel Shanks for the opportunity to publish my thoughts in English. I used the DeepL program for the translation. I thank Anna-Lena Brown for the final proofreading.

The Education-Industrial Complex Going Global

Anthony Picciano — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0200

In 1994, I first wrote about an education-industrial complex that was emerging in the United States. The education-industrial complex was defined as networks of ideological, technophile and for-profit entities that sought to promote their beliefs, ideas, products and services in furtherance of their own goals and objectives. In the years since, the education-industrial complex has grown into a global phenomenon and has become a major force among powerful players (i.e., mega-corporations, international interest groups, and government officials) to influence education policy. This paper describes the present global education-industrial complex and concludes with a call to monitor and study its further evolution.

Knowing what’s normal. The Production and Conveyance of Knowledge via Menstrual Tracking Apps and what that has to do with Capitalism

Lilli Riettiens — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0200

Menstrual tracking applications that enable users to translate bodily states in relation to their menstrual cycle into data by means of predefined categories are part of the growing lifelogging and (self-)datafication trend. Combining questions on customisation and capitalistic logics in the digital present, the article first reveals two levels of (self-)disciplining by interweaving exemplary observations of the menstrual tracking application Flo with theoretical considerations. In the subsequent analysis, it becomes apparent that human and algorithmic optimisation in the context of menstrual tracking applications merge in an almost economic process. Through the interrelationships among (self-)discipline, health, and capitalism, technology-induced pre-sortings and algorithmic prefigurations become visible, prompting a debate on the modes of subjection in the digital present.

Customised Diversity?

Valentin Dander, Lilli Riettiens, Rachel Shanks, Nina Grünberger, Theo Hug — Thu, 19 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0200

The notion of diversity is widely accepted as a positive value in Europe and beyond. However, in the context of current capitalist relations in general, diversity has long since developed into a marketable slogan and has been customised as a technology of corporate management. Under the formula “customised diversity?”, this special issue addresses a core ambivalence of capitalist markets. In this regard, the educational context is particularly interesting as Big Tech and for-profit educational industries are pushing into the ed tech (educational technology) sector, seeking to install mono-cultures of digital infrastructures of teaching and learning.

This issue brings together different traces of capitalism in the digital age through all types of education and media and across several European countries. The empirical and theoretical contributions examine how capitalist logics shape educational technologies, policies, and research practices, often prioritising datafication, measurability, and optimisation. They ask how media education can support democratic, equitable, and sustainable futures, and how researchers can challenge the reproduction of capitalist structures in education through critical, utopian, or subversive practices.