Heideggers Philosophie der Medialität

This book does not claim to etch into relief a media philosophy from Heidegger's thinking in addition to the various philosophies of language, technology, art or science already extant. Rather, its claim is a fundamental one: to show that this thinking – even if this is admittedly not immediately apparent on the surface of its terminology – is itself a philosophy of mediality, establishing its own approach to media philosophy. Setting out from an interpretation of being as mediality, the author first undertakes a comprehensive reconstruction of Heidegger's philosophy in order to subsequently relate it to basic questions of media philosophy and the anthropology of technology. The result is not only a fresh view that questions established modes of reception and lends Heidegger's thinking a new, unexpected plausibility, but in particular a theoretical basis for a critical examination of the media-technological dispositives and dynamics of the 21st century.

Technikanthropologie

This handbook provides an overview of approaches to, and methods and topics on a historical anthropology of technology. This includes basic concepts, the variety of human technical concepts, technicised practices and the technicisation of senses and skills. Furthermore, it presents important representatives of an anthropology of technology since the early modern period. With its interdisciplinary approach, this volume historically and systematically approaches various problems relating to humans and machines that are currently being debated. At the centre of attention is the quintessential anthropological question of what a ‘human being’ is with respect to technology. However, this consideration does not derive from the concept of a unique, unchanging essence of man, but examines the historical changes of man through and with technology. Particularly in light of new technologies such as digitisation and artificial intelligence research, the relationship between humans and machines is once again on the agenda, in which humans and humanity seem to be the subject of discussion.

Nurturing and Balancing the World: A Relational Approach to Rock Art and Technology from North Central Chile (Southern Andes)

Technology has been a central theme in archaeological discussion. Different approaches have been developed in order to understand and better explain the processes that lead to the production of objects and things. The anthropology of technology has been one such effort, with its focus on technological style and the chaîne opératoire. In this paper we argue that, despite their many contributions, these approaches tend to isolate the process of production, as well as to see it as the imposition of culture over nature. Instead, we propose a relational approach to technology, one that considers the multiple participants in the social actions involved, stressing the affective qualities of the different entities participating in the process of making. We focus this discussion on the production process of rock art in North Central Chile by Diaguita communities (c. ad 1000–c. 1540), arguing that making petroglyphs was a central activity that aimed at the balancing of the world and its participants, creating a mediating space that facilitated connectedness between the multiple members of the Diaguita world, humans and other-than-humans.