“Techno-vulnerability: Affective Interactions in Robot Performances” – Ruowen Xu

Positioned in Transmission in Motion’s “Performing Robots” research sector, this project “Techno-vulnerability: Affective Interactions in Robot Performances” investigates technology’s mediation, transformation, disposal and production of a range of vulnerabilities throughout the process of human-robot interaction. Delving into the collapsed, interrupted, failed and malfunctioning episodes in the robot performances, the study discusses humans and robots’ vulnerabilities in their technology-mediated bodily encounters. It also renders and theorizes the notion of the “techno-vulnerability,” to account for the posthuman subjectivity imbricated with other bodies, technology and the discursive nexus in practice, to display the philosophical and political dynamics of the human-technology assemblages that are exposed to existing and emerging paradigms of power relations.

Ruowen Xu earned the MA from the University of Amsterdam with a background in Comparative Literature, Cultural Studies and Japanese Theatre. She continued to conduct the Ph.D. research at the Institute of Culture Inquiries on robotic art and android theatre, under the supervision of Professor Maaike Bleeker.

*Featured image by David Mc Lean