Theorizing AI In Turbulent Times

The advent of generative artificial intelligence (genAI), such as large language models and image generation models, has reconfigured several aspects of social, political, and cultural life. While fields such as the digital humanities and communication studies have proposed theoretical frameworks and concepts to make sense of genAI and its socio-cultural effects, sociological theory has not followed suit to the same extent. The session is interested in addressing this gap by fostering sociological theorization of three dimensions of genAI: a) its ontological and epistemological foundations (how models are designed and operate, the social and cultural assumptions that they contain, etc.) b) its institutional uses (for content creation, evaluation of persons and groups, decision-making, etc.); and c) its socio-cultural and political effects (transformed understandings of human vs. machine capacities, disinformation, AI slop, labour market disruptions, etc.). The session welcomes papers that advance theoretical understandings of one or more of these three dimensions of genAI, as well as those that draw upon classical and/or contemporary social and cultural theory to explore other aspects of genAI in the contemporary world.