Coloniality of Data (fusion on-site)

Social and ethical concerns with 'data-driven' practices tend to focus on the 'garbage in, garbage out' problem - i.e., how inequality comes to be embedded in the production and application of 'bad data', and the imperative to produce and use data more responsibly. This course proposes that these concerns, while not irrelevant, are inadequate; for the problem of inequality does not only lie in 'bad data' but in the notion of data itself. This course interrogates data as a colonial phenomenon produced by epistemic difference - i.e., by inequalities and exclusions regarding what counts as knowing and acting in this world. It locates 'data' within the genealogy of knowledge production to highlight its coloniality.   Credit level: 11 Year taken: Postgraduate SCQF credits: 10