Unmediated

(3 Credits)

When every waking and resting moment of daily life is filtered through a screen, what remains of our "unmediated" selves? Is direct connection to environment and community still possible, or have we outsourced our identities and cognition to the cloud, like characters in dystopian films or fictions who cannot feel the weight of experiences that fall outside a technologically managed world? This course invites students to step outside our technological world to live as much as possible without digital technology. Free from phones, laptops and other digital devices, we examine how technology can mediate the self, manipulate our desires, and lead us to view the self as an object to be measured and optimized. Fieldwork in Abu Dhabi takes us trekking the UAE terrain with no digital aids and understanding the physiological impact of tech-free living. Finally, as we prepare to re-enter the technological world, we ask whether technology has a goal of its own—a telos—at odds with our own, what balance to strike between slow, unmediated living and a reactive, mediated life, and how to maintain this balance. This course involves hiking. Students must be without phones/computers for 2 weeks.