Exploring AI-in-the-making: Sociomaterial genealogies of AI performativity

Abstract

Recent interest in artificial intelligence technologies has led to much discussion about what the age of AI portends for how we live and work. And specifically for the present discussion, what it means for agency. In offering our contributions to these considerations, we build on approaches to treat AI not as a “thing” but as phenomena in-the-making. Such a framing orients us to doings, to practices, to enactments, and consequential outcomes. These considerations of AI-in-the-making are inspired by agential realism, a theory that calls attention to performativity and accountability. Based on these ideas, we propose a sociomaterial genealogical approach that we suggest is well-suited for the study of AI-in-the-making. In so doing, we provide qualitative scholars with a way of orienting their inquiries toward the performativity of ongoing AI reconfigurations and sociomaterial accountabilities.