Research Seminar - After the Future: Heat, Collapse, and Exhausting the “Future of Work”

After the Future: Heat, Collapse, and Exhausting the “Future of Work”

Presented by: Dr Luke Munn

Date: Friday 4 August 2023
Time: 12-1pm
Location: Online via Zoom and in-person at the SCA Writer's Studio (Level 6, Michie Building)

Abstract

In the summer of 2022, Amazon Flex encountered an unexpected force: heat. Their algorithm promised to optimize labor, scheduling the most efficient routes. But as temperatures rose in the USA, workers began to wear out, succumbing to fainting and vomiting. “It felt like putting your head in an oven,” one stated, “I would press my face against the AC just to try and feel the cold air.”

The future of work is melting. We were told that brilliant technologies would amplify productivity (Brynjolfsson and McAfee 2014) and catalyze economic growth (ECLAC 2021), using algorithmic management to deliver on demand and at scale (Munn 2018). But climate change has begun to unravel these imaginaries. Infinite growth has confronted a finite world.

Heat in particular crystallizes this confrontation, bringing bodies to their limits and introducing forms of contingency that are not captured in technical media (Munn 2023 forthcoming). Drawing together energy histories, worker stories, and climate conditions, this seminar theorizes heat as an anti-medium, the first sign of an unprecedented “new normal” that exposes the futility of business as usual and forces us to explore alternative configurations of mediated labor. 

Presenter

Luke Munn is a Research Fellow in Digital Cultures & Societies at the University of Queensland. His wide-ranging work on digital cultures has been featured in highly regarded journals such as Cultural Politics, Big Data & Society, and New Media & Society as well as popular forums like the Guardian, the Los Angeles Times, and the Washington Post. He has written six books: Unmaking the Algorithm (2018), Logic of Feeling (2020), Automation is a Myth (2022), Countering the Cloud (2022), Red Pilled (2023) and Technical Territories (2023). His latest project explores the growing confrontation between digital technologies and climate contingencies through the lens of heat.