Data and Justice

4 credits · Undergraduate

This course engages students with fundamental questions of justice in relation to data and computing in American society. Data collection, visualization, and analysis have been entangled in the struggle for racial and social justice because they can make injustice visible, imaginable, and thus actionable. Data has also been used to oppress minoritized communities and institutionalize, rationalize, and naturalize systems of racial violence. The course examines key sites of justice involving data (such as citizenship, policing, prisons, environment, and health). Along with critical social science tools, students gain introductory experience and do collaborative and creative projects with data science using real-world data.