Media Studies, Software and Critical Code Studies, Cultural Studies, History of Technology, Philosophy of Technology
Dr. Alexander Monea is an Assistant Professor serving jointly in George Mason's English Department and Cultural Studies Department. He received his PhD in Communication, Rhetoric, & Digital Media from North Carolina State University after completing a project that traced the historical entanglement of computation, big data, and governmentality in the United States. His recent publications range from analytical work focused on specific computational apparatuses, like Google's Knowledge Graph, to more theoretical critiques of speculation, to methodological meditations on doing politically meaningful media studies research.
My current research focuses on examining computation and its attendant technological implementations and peripheral supports. In particular, I am working to analyze the history of computation through genealogies of numerical mediation, 'big' data, predictive analytics, and other points of entanglement between computation, governmentality, and/or capital.
Monea, A. (2016). The Graphing of Difference: Numerical Mediation and the Case of Google’s Knowledge Graph. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies. (VIEW)
Monea, A. & Packer, J. (2016). Media Genealogy and the Politics of Archaeology. The International Journal of Communication, 10, 3141–3159. (VIEW)
Monea, A. (2016). An Archive for the Future: Paul N. Edwards on Technology, Historiography, Self and World. The International Journal of Communication, 10, 3174–3185. (VIEW)
Monea, A. (2016). Graph Force: Rhetorical Machines and the N-Arization of Knowledge. Computational Culture, 5. (VIEW)
May, M. & Monea, A. (2016). Beyond the Possible. Cultural Critique, 92, 139–152. (PREVIEW)
Faculty Research and Development Award, 2018, College of Humanities and Social Sciences, George Mason University
CULT 816 – Science & Technology
CULT 860 – Culture, Media, & Technology
ENGH 676 – Intro to Cultural Studies
ENGH 470 RS – Science & Technoculture in the History of Film
ENGH 451 – Science Fiction
ENGH 375/ENGH 507 – Web Authorship & Design
ENGH 318 – Intro to Cultural Studies
PhD, North Carolina State University, 2016
MA, Bowling Green State University, 2012
BA, Walsh University, 2010
“I Know It When I See It”: An Overview of Google’s SafeSearch and the Politics of Automating Judgment. Presentation at Society for Cinema and Media Studies 2018 Conference. March 17th, 2018. (VIEW)
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Towards a Speculative Code Studies. Invited talk. Mellon DH Seminar hosted by the University of Pennsylvania's Price Lab for the Digital Humanities. Philadelphia, PA. October 24th, 2016. (VIEW)
Google's Knowledge Graph & Future-Histories of Thought. Invited talk. Control Societies Speaker Series, University of Pennsylvania. Philadelphia, PA. October 24th, 2016. (VIEW)
German Media Studies: From Culture to Technology and Back Again. Presentation at the Crossroads in Cultural Studies 2016 Biannual Conference. December, 2016.