media theory reading circle
4 October 2026
This week we will be reading and dicussing Byung Chul-Han's Psychopolitics, in particular chapters 1-6.
https://stuartjmurray.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Han-Psychopolitics.pdf
We start at 4:15 promptly.
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WHAT IS THIS?
this is a reading and discussion circle, focused on media theory, spectacle, and the politics, sociology, and anthropology of technology through an STS lens. we will read a wide range of authors and viewpoints, and welcome any additions! We will meet every Sunday at 4PM!
what is STS? STS stands for science and technology studies, an interdisciplinary field focused on the metastudy of science, big Science ™️, technology, and the interplay of those elements in society.
Rough timeline
Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death
Langdon Winner, “Do Artifacts Have Politics?”
Jean Baudrillard, excerpts from Simulacra and Simulation
Byung Chul-Han, Psychopolitics
Byung Chul-Han, The Burnout Society
Anton Jager, Hyperpolitics
Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism
Guy Debord, Society of the Spectacle
Guy Debord, Comments on the Society of the Spectacle
Michel Foucault, excerpts from Discipline and Punish, small primer on the panopticon.
Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media
Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction
Walter Ong, Orality and Literacy
Theodor Adorno, excerpts from Minima Moralia
Jacques Ellul, The Technological Society
Martin Heidegger, Die Frage nach der Technik (The Question Concerning Technology)
Oswald Spengler, Der Mensch und die Technik (Man and Technics)
Edward Djikstra, On The Cruelty of Really Teaching Computer Science
Joseph Weizenbaum, Computer Power and Human Reason