RHET AI: Center for Rhetorical Science Communication Research on Artificial Intelligence.
The RHET AI Center in Tübingen, in cooperation with the Chair of Science Communication with a focus on Linguistics at KIT, is investigating science communication about artificial intelligence from a rhetorical, linguistic and media science perspective.
Research Unit 1, which is based in Karlsruhe and Tübingen, deals with the question of which social discourses are conducted around artificial intelligence, which thematic focuses and narratives appear in these discourses, which actors co-determine these discourses and how these discourses are conducted on a linguistic and rhetorical level.
The researchers are investigating how communication about AI is shaped
The following basic assumptions play a central role: communication about artificial intelligence and its research is shaped and transformed by thematic and narrative structures. As a basis for the discourse-analytical research work in Unit 1, a total of three corpora on thematic, topical, but also fictional and pictorial structures in AI discourse will be built up and analyzed in cooperation with the Institute of Media Studies. The RHET AI Center itself will also generate data and materials from focus groups, citizens' conferences and online chats between researchers and learners over the course of the funding phase.
The Center is divided into five research units
Unit 1 is also home to the journalist-in-residence program for experienced science journalists offeredby the RHET AI Center in cooperation with Cyber Valley. During their stay, the journalists have the opportunity to learn about the basics and limits of machine learning, computer vision and robotics.
In addition, the Artificial Friday online colloquium deals with questions about artificial intelligence from a linguistic perspective. The colloquium started in spring 2022 and has been held regularly since then due to the high level of participation. Dates for the Artificial Friday in the winter semester will be announced shortly. Further information can also be found on the Artificial Friday homepage.
GAL research focus "Artificial Intelligence"
As part of Artificial Friday, the Society for Applied Linguistics (GAL) presented its new research focus on artificial intelligence. The research focus deals with the coexistence and integration of AI and contemporary societies, in particular with the interplay between language, culture and AI. It enables greater visibility of linguistic engagement with artificial intelligence and, above all, the institutionalization of linguistic AI research, as represented by Unit 1. This provides linguists working on AI with networking opportunities.
The research focus is coordinated by Dr. Nina Kalwa, Dr. Monika Hanauska and Prof. Dr. Annette Leßmöllmann.
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Partner
University of Tübingen (Department of Rhetoric, Institute of Media Studies, Cluster of Excellence Machine Learning in Science), Cyber Valley, Wissenschaft im Dialog, OBVIA Montréal
Sponsor:
Volkswagen Foundation
Participating scientists
Presentations
Announcement: Poster presentation: GAL research focus. Artificial Intelligence and Linguistics, presented at the GAL Section Conference 2024 (TU Dresden, 11.-13.09.2024)
Announcement: Kalwa, Nina: Imitations of the Human - On the Disruption of Human Communication by Artificial Intelligence. Presentation in the section "Digital Humanities" at the international DGS-Congress 2024 "Zeichen. Cultures. Digitality" (RPTU Landau, 24.-28.09.2024)
Announcement: Attar, Patrizia: Knowledge about AI in Wikipedia - a cultural linguistic analysis. Presentation at the GAL Section Conference 2024 (TU Dresden, 11.-13.09.2024)
Köhler, Anna-Marie: Persuasive algorithms - a question of ethos? Presentation at the internationalworkshop "Kultur und Technik - Kulturwissenschaftlicher Blick auf KI" (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 12-13.07.2024), 13.07.2024
Hanauska, Monika: Trust, look who? The linguistic construction of trustworthiness and distrustworthiness in the context of AI reporting. Presentation at the international workshop "Kultur und Technik - Kulturwissenschaftlicher Blick auf KI" (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 12.-13.07.2024), 12.07.2024
Kalwa, Nina: Understanding (non-)understanding - potentials of qualitative digital linguistics. Lecture at the DGPuk specialist group conference Media Language - Media Discourses "Understanding and Understanding in the Digital Space" (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 29.02.-01.03.2024), 29.02.2024.
Attar, Patrizia and Franziska Buresch: Between enlightenment and intransparency: Are the term black box and the concept of understanding mutually exclusive? Presentation at the DGPuk specialist group conference Media Language - Media Discourses "Understanding and Understanding in the Digital Space" (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 29.02.-01.03.2024), 29.02.2024.
Köhler, Anna-Marie and Salina Weber: ChatGPT as the ideal tutor? An ethical question. Presentation at the DGPuk specialist group conference Media Language - Media Discourses "Understanding and Communication in the Digital Space" (Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 29.02.-01.03.2024), 29.02.2024.
Franziska Buresch: Between bot banana and AI chatterbox: Keywords in the discourse around CHatGPT. Lecture at the Artificial Friday, Karlsruhe, 03.11.2023.
Monika Hanauska: Of robots, algorithms and super-intelligent machines: AI in non-fiction. Lecture at the workshop "Literarische Sachbücher. Forms - Functions - Practices", Bonn, 14-15.09.2023.
Anna Köhler: ChatGPT as an ideal tutor? A question of ethos. Presentation as part of the panel collaboration "Rhetorical literacy as AI literacy: An instructional approach" by Jugend Präsentiert and the RHET AI Center at the SUNY Conference, New York (USA), 14.10.2023.
Monika Hanauska, Annette Leßmöllmann, Nina Kalwa: Distrusting self-driving cars, trusting Alexa. A discourse linguistic investigation of trust in Artificial Intelligence. Presentation at the 18th International Pragmatics Conference, Brussels, 10.07.2023.
Monika Hanauska: Wise, smart, creative machines? Negotiations on the term "artificial intelligence" in comments on science blog posts. Presentation at the Artificial Friday, 10.02.2023.
Monika Hanauska: Between the great future and bugging Alexa: how knowledge about artificial intelligence is produced in public discourses. Lecture as part of the Night of Science Karlsruhe, 18.11.2022
Monika Hanauska: Serviceable robots, self-driving cars, autonomous killer drones? Conceptualizations of AI in the German-language media. Presentation at the German-Chinese workshop: Intercultural Understanding of Technology and Artificial Intelligence. Shanghai/Karlsruhe, 17./18.11.2022
Monika Hanauska, Nina Kalwa, Annette Leßmöllmann: Unboxing the blackbox AI. Poster presentation at the conference "AI and Futures of Societies" of the Volkswagen Foundation, Hanover 12-14.10.2022
Susanne Marschall, Annette Leßmöllmann: Center for Rhetorical Science Communication on Artificial Intelligence. Lecture at the kick-off event "Wissenschaftskommunikation Hoch Drei" of the Volkswagen Foundation, Hanover 19-20.09.2022
Nina Kalwa, Monika Hanauska, Annette Leßmöllmann: Distrusting the blackbox AI. Presentation at the international conference Scientific Expertise, Communication and Trust (SECAT) at the University of Aarhus, 27/28.09.2022
Nina Kalwa: Talking about deepfakes. On the loss of trust in the moving image. Lecture in the working group "Interdisciplinary Approaches to Deepfakes" on 07.07.2022 at the Institute for Technology Assessment and Systems Analysis of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
Nina Kalwa: Doing human. The linguistic production of humans in AI discourses. Lecture as part of the lecture series "Rhetoric, Media Studies and Artificial Intelligence" at the University of Tübingen, 28.06.2022
Nina Kalwa: Talking about Blackbox, Terminator and us. AI in journalistic and social media. Lecture at the colloquium of the Ludwig Uhland Institute for Empirical Cultural Studies "AI and Society" on 02.06.2022 in Tübingen
Monika Hanauska, Nina Kalwa, Annette Leßmöllmann: AI in linguistics and science communication. Lecture as part of the lecture series "Rhetoric, Media Studies and Artificial Intelligence" at the University of Tübingen, 17.05.2022
Monika Hanauska, Nina Kalwa, Annette Leßmöllmann: AI and linguistics - potentials of a linguistic examination of artificial intelligence. Lecture as part of the linguistic colloquium Artificial Friday, 06.05.2022
Annette Leßmöllmann: The Terminator and AI: Reporting and Discourses on Artificial Intelligence. Keynote lecture as part of the information event on the Journalist-in-Residence program of the RHET AI Center, 24.01.2022
Seminars
Leßmöllmann, Annette/Kalwa, Nina: Science communication and artificial intelligence. Master's seminar as part of the Science - Media - Communication degree program, WS 2024/25
Hanauska, Monika: Communication of trust in the public AI discourse. Master's seminar as part of the Science - Media - Communication degree program, WS 2024/25
Panel discussions
Annette Leßmöllmann, Susanne Marschall, Olaf Kramer: Panel discussion at the end of the lecture series "Rhetoric, Media Studies and Artificial Intelligence" at the University of Tübingen, 17.07.2022
Colloquia
Linguistic colloquium "Artificial Friday": Presentation of linguistic perspectives on artificial intelligence
Summer semester 2024
Alyssa Kutzner, Kirsten Schindler (Wuppertal): AI and writing in school: stocktaking, trials, findings, 12.07.2024
Britta Schneider (Frankfurt/Oder): Posthumanist Linguistics, Colonialism and AI: How Language Technologies Reproduce and Reconfigure Global Power Structures, 12.07.2024
Ellen Fricke (Chemnitz): Addressee Design and Intentional Complexity: Semiotic Perspectives on Processes of Anthropomorphization, 21.06.2024
Jan Georg Schneider (Landau): Intelligible textures: what role can ChatGPT play in essay evaluation?, 21.06.2024
Simon Meier-Vieracker (Dresden): No Choice. Reflections on the stylistics of generated texts, 17.05.2024
Tamara Bodden (Kassel), poster presentation: Artficial Gender - The linguistic construction of gender in AI, 17.05.2024
Alyssa Kutzner (Wuppertal), poster presentation: Text Machine or Writing Artist? The transformative influence of artificial intelligence on writing in secondary education, 17.05.2024
Kuanyong Qiu (Zurich), poster presentation: Shaping AI in Chinese and German Media Discourse. Pre- and Post-Launch of ChatGPT, 17.05.2024
Winter semester 2023/24
Anna Köhler (Tübingen): Protest in AI Discourse, 12.01.2024
Ramona Plitt (Dresden): "When machines compose..." - then what? Linguistic peculiarities in writing about artificial creativity, 12.01.2024
Carole Bourgadel (Graz): Technology and progress in translation: a discourse of mystification? After a critical analysis by J. Ellul, 01.12.2023
Yannic Frommherz (Dresden): Human-language assistant interactions between naturalness and error-proneness, 01.12.2023
Franziska Buresch (Karlsruhe): Between bot banana and AI chatterbox: Keywords in the discourse around ChatGPT, 03.11.2023
Natalie Sontopski (Dresden): Doing AI. Ethnographic research in the field of Creative AI, 03.11.2023
Summer semester 2023
Anna Puzio (Twente, Netherlands): Robots, do you love me? Anthropological-ethical reflections on human-robot interaction, 14.07.2023
Jenifer Becker (Hildesheim): Neuronal Inspiration: Artificial Intelligence and Literary Narrative, 14.07.2023
Bruno Gransche (Karlsruhe): Artificial intelligence as created newborns and artificial offspring? On the conceptual cross-pollination between the living and the artificial, 23.06.2023
Markus Gottschling (Tübingen): Transformer-Rhetorik, 23.06.2023
Dafna Burema (Berlin): A sociological perspective of AI etics, 12.05.2023
Andrew Piper (Montréal, Canada): Using GPT for narrative text annotation, 12.05.2023
Winter semester 2022/23
Netaya Lotze (Münster): Semantic dialog coherence in human-machine interactions, 10.02.2023
Monika Hanauska (Karlsruhe): Wise, smart, creative machines? Negotiations about the term "artificial intelligence" in comments on science blog posts, 10.02.2023
Noah Bubenhofer (Zurich): Coding Cultures and Modeling Cultures: A cultural linguistic view on scripting and AI, 13.01.2023
Christoph Purschke (Luxembourg): Cultural Language Processing - Why language processing is not "natural", 13.01.2023
Jean Nitze (Kristiansand): Machine translation - curse, blessing and everyday life for translation, 02.12.2022
Philipp Dreesen/Julia Krasselt (Winterthur): Research results on automated driving as a discursive object, 02.12.2022
Olaf Kramer (Tübingen): Rhetoric of the AI discourse, 04.11.2022
Derya Gür-Seker (Essen): Let's talk about AI! A social media analysis, 04.11.2022
Summer semester 2022
Joachim Scharloth (Tokyo): Flat ontologies for the human black box, 01.07.2022
Nina Janich (Darmstadt): Uncertain Futures - Public Scientific Statements on AI, 01.07.2022
Theresa Hey (Greifswald): Congrats AI! Algorithmic meta-discourses, 03.06.2022
Miriam Lind (Mainz): Maid Alexa and secretary Siri. Linguistic humanization of digital systems, 03.06.2022
Monika Hanauska, Nina Kalwa, Annette Leßmöllmann (Karlsruhe): AI and linguistics - potentials of a linguistic examination of artificial intelligence, 06.05.2022
Jan Engberg (Aarhus): How deep do popularizers dive into AI? Proposal for a measurement, 06.05.2022
External science communication
Annette Leßmöllmann, Science Notes: Invisible feat. coherent. SILBERSALZ Science & Media Festival in Halle, 27.10.2023.
Annette Leßmöllmann and Olaf Kramer (Speaker RHET AI, University of Tübingen), Fishbowl Discussion: AI and Journalism. WISSENSWERTE in Freiburg, 25.10.2023.
Annette Leßmöllmann: "Know better": When AI speaks." Tagesspiegel, 04.06.2023.
Annette Leßmöllmann: "Know better". A real hoax." Tagesspiegel, 23.12.2022.
Nina Kalwa: Participation in the linguistics podcast tuwort by Joachim Scharloth and Noah Bubenhofer on the topic of discourses on AI. https://www. tuwort.com/index.php/2022/08/20/tuwort-spezial-2-diskurse-ueber-ki/, published on 20.08.2022
Monika Hanauska, Nina Kalwa, Annette Leßmöllmann: Of helpful robots and uncontrollable machines. Discourses and narratives on artificial intelligence. Blog post in the research blog of the KIT Center "Humans and Technology". https://www. mensch-und-technik.kit.edu/DIskurseKI.php, published on 15.08.2022
Sina Metz: Humanoid robots and dystopias: Images of AI. Interview with Nina Kalwa on wissenschaftskommunikation.de. https://www. wissenschaftskommunikation.de/humanoide-roboter-und-dystopien-bilder-von-ki-57167/, published on 26.04.2022