Countertechnologies: Better Technology Through Critical Practice

Aim

This module trains computer scientists to become critical practitioners of technology. Students encounter major intellectual traditions from outside computer science (philosophy of technology, media theory, science and technology studies, critical race studies, and the history and sociology of computing) and learn to apply these perspectives to the analysis and design of technical systems. The distinctive aim is that critique leads to construction: students do not merely identify what is wrong with technology, but design and build technical artefacts that embody alternative approaches. By the end of the module, students can articulate what is problematic about a technology, explain why using arguments grounded in scholarly traditions, and demonstrate what a better alternative would look like by building one.

Objectives

LO1. Critically analyse technology as a practitioner. Examine computing technologies, artefacts, and practices by surfacing unstated assumptions, tracing power relations, interrogating evidence claims, and situating them within broader social, political, and historical contexts.  

• LO1a. Analyse an existing technical system using multiple critical perspectives, drawing on concepts from philosophy of technology, STS, media theory, critical race studies, or related fields.  

• LO1b. Reflect on one's own position, assumptions, and formative influences as a technologist, and articulate how these shape the systems one builds and the critiques one offers.  

LO2. Think across disciplinary boundaries. Read, interpret, and apply ideas from intellectual traditions outside computer science to construct original arguments about technology.  

• LO2a. Engage with primary texts from unfamiliar disciplines on their own terms, understanding their methods, evidence standards, and modes of argument.

• LO2b. Apply concepts and frameworks from these traditions to new technical contexts, generating insights that would not arise from within CS alone.  

LO3. Respond constructively: build and defend a better alternative. Translate critical analysis into a concrete technical artefact and a sustained argument for why it represents an improvement.  

• LO3a. Design and build a technical artefact that embodies a critical position, demonstrating that critique can produce materially different technology, not just commentary.  

• LO3b. Construct and defend a normative argument for the alternative, engaging seriously with counterarguments, acknowledging tradeoffs, and reasoning through cases where values conflict.

Syllabus

Session 1: What kind of thing is technology? Tradition: Philosophy of technology. Introducing definitional and ontological questions about technology before critique begins.  

• Readings: Ellul, The Technological Society, Part I Ch. 1 "Technique"; Franklin, The Real World of Technology, Chapters 1–2. Debate: Is technology a single autonomous force pursuing efficiency (Ellul), or does it come in qualitatively different kinds with different political structures (Franklin)?  

Session 2: How does technology change how we think, and should we care? Tradition: Media theory. Examining the cognitive and perceptual effects of technology, not politics or economics, but what technology does to consciousness.  

• Readings: McLuhan, Understanding Media, Ch. 1 "The Medium is the Message"; Ong, Orality and Literacy, Ch. 4 "Writing Restructures Consciousness"; Weizenbaum, Computer Power and Human Reason, Introduction. Debate: Is the reshaping of cognition by technology something to be understood (McLuhan/Ong) or something to be resisted (Weizenbaum)?  

Session 3: How do technological "truths" get established? Tradition: STS / sociology of knowledge. How does a technology become accepted as "working"? How does something move from controversial to settled?  

• Readings: Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Ch. II + IX; Latour, "Why Has Critique Run Out of Steam?" (2004), Critical Inquiry. Debate: Once you show truth-claims are socially constructed, can you prevent that insight from being weaponised?  

Session 4: How do we know if technology is actually working? Tradition: Empirical critique. Not about values, but about measurement and evidence of impact.  

• Readings: Landauer, The Trouble with Computers, Part I "The Productivity Puzzle"; Illich, Tools for Conviviality, Ch. 1 "Two Watersheds." Debate: Is the productivity paradox a temporary design failure (Landauer) or a structural inevitability (Illich)?

Session 5: Whose interests does technology serve? Tradition: Critical race and technology / political critique. Differential impact by race, class, and gender.  

• Readings: Winner, "Do Artifacts Have Politics?" (1980); Benjamin, Race After Technology, Introduction "The New Jim Code." Debate: If artifacts embed politics, is better design sufficient, or does the problem run deeper than any single artifact?  

Session 6: Who gets to be a technologist, and how does that shape what's built? Tradition: History and sociology of computing. About the profession itself, not individual artefacts but the culture that produces them.  

• Readings: Ensmenger, The Computer Boys Take Over, Ch. 1; Turner, From Counterculture to Cyberculture, Introduction + Ch. 1. Debate: Is computing's culture shaped more by who is admitted (Ensmenger) or what narratives they adopt (Turner)?  

Session 7: Can the builder also be the critic? Tradition: Critical technical practice / reflexive practice. Turning the lens on the student themselves.

•  Readings: Agre, "Toward a Critical Technical Practice" (1997); Schön, The Reflective Practitioner, Ch. 2 "From Technical Rationality to Reflection-in-Action." Debate: Do you need external critical theory to see your own blind spots (Agre), or just better habits of self-awareness (Schön)?  

Session 8: Show us. Student presentations of capstone works-in-progress. Student peers consider the material presented and then submit written critiques (questions, comments, and provocations) asynchronously; students then respond to these critiques in a separately assessed appendix to the project report.  

• No assigned reading.  

Assessment

Project report (80%):

•   A single critical report (up to 5,000 words) comprising: a critique of a computing technology or practice using perspectives from outside CS; a description of a technical artefact the student has designed and built in response to the critique; a normative argument for why the alternative is better, engaging counterarguments and acknowledging tradeoffs; and a proposal for how the alternative could be evaluated. The report is self-contained: a reader should understand the critique, the artefact, and the argument from the essay alone.  

Peer critique response (10%):

•  During presentations in session 8, students will submit questions, essentially countercritiques for each others’ work. Conveners may also submit questions. Each student will self-select a small number of the best questions to respond to, and include a 500 word response to these questions as an appendix to their project report, which we will separately grade.  

Technical artefact (10%):

•  Students submit a code repository as supplementary evidence. The primary grading of this artefact will be done through the corresponding section of the project report. However we will additionally look at the artefact itself and grade accordingly.

Required readings (specific chapters assigned per session)

•  Ellul, J. (1964). The Technological Society. Vintage. Franklin, U. (1990).  The Real World of Technology.
• CBC Enterprises. (Rev. ed. 1999, House of Anansi.) McLuhan, M. (1964).
• Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man. McGraw-Hill. Ong, W. (1982).
•  Orality and Literacy. Methuen. Weizenbaum, J. (1976).
• Computer Power and Human Reason. W.H. Freeman. Kuhn, T. (1962).
• The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. University of Chicago Press. Latour, B. (2004).
• "Why Has Critique Run Out of Steam? From Matters of Fact to Matters of Concern." Critical Inquiry 30(2): 225–248. Landauer, T.K. (1995).
• The Trouble with Computers. MIT Press. Illich, I. (1973). Tools for Conviviality. Harper & Row. Winner, L. (1986).
•  "Do Artifacts Have Politics?" in The Whale and the Reactor. University of Chicago Press. Benjamin, R. (2019).
• Race After Technology. Polity. Ensmenger, N. (2010). The Computer Boys Take Over. MIT Press. Turner, F. (2006).
• From Counterculture to Cyberculture. University of Chicago Press. Agre, P. (1997). "Toward a Critical Technical Practice: Lessons Learned in Trying to Reform AI." In Bowker et al. (eds.), Bridging the Great Divide. Erlbaum. Schön, D. (1983).
•  The Reflective Practitioner. Basic Books.

Further reading

•  Heidegger, The Question Concerning Technology;
• Feenberg, Questioning Technology;
• Mumford, Technics and Civilization;
• Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death;
• Carr, The Shallows; Reeves & Nass, The Media Equation;
• Collins & Pinch, The Golem; Feyerabend, Against Method;
• Scott, Seeing Like a State;
• Toyama, Geek Heresy; Morozov, To Save Everything Click Here;
• Ames, The Charisma Machine;
• Arendt, The Human Condition;
• Noble, Algorithms of Oppression; Eubanks, Automating Inequality;
• Crawford, Atlas of AI; Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism;
• O'Neil, Weapons of Math Destruction;
• Hicks, Programmed Inequality;
•  Daub, What Tech Calls Thinking;
• Graeber, Bullshit Jobs; Suchman, Plans and Situated Actions;
• Dourish, "Implications for Design" (2006);
• Wiener, The Human Use of Human Beings; Dunne & Raby, Speculative Everything;
• Williams, Disabling Intelligences: Legacies of Eugenics and How We are Wrong about AI;
• Roozenbeek, The Psychology of Misinformation;
• Lucy, Heritage, & Sugiura, Researching Incels: A Critical Feminist Intervention;
• Chokshi & Mansell, The Need to Rename Tech;
• Costanza-Chock, Design Justice: Community-Led Practices to Build the Worlds We Need;
• Haimson, Trans Technologies; DISCO Network, Technoskepticism: Between Possibility and Refusal;
• Williams, Accessible UX Research