Is the AI we use to understand the world might be restricting the way we view the world? AI systems are playing an increasingly important role in analysis, prediction, and decision-making. However, they are trained on mainstream and uncritical datasets that reproduce stereotypical gender roles, abilities, and behavioral patterns, reinforcing biases, which leads to a limited understanding of society.
The creation of generative AI tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude are widely vilified as a crime against the climate. The massive amounts of energy, water, and natural resources used in their creation is well-documented--or at least as well as restrictive interpretations of proprietary knowledge will allow.
AI, LLMs and the mobilization of large data sets are reshaping research, work, learning, and daily life. They are exerting influence on politics, media, business decisions, resource allocation, and education. This graduate course will apply a feminist, critical race STS lens to understand the operation and uses of AI in research. We will examine what historical impacts, cultural factors, and forces of oppression may be operating in AI and directing data flows.
This summer, the Feminist Research Institute hosted interns due to the generous sponsorship of the CITRIS Banatao Institute. We wanted to highlight our summer interns, namely who they are, what their final project was, what they learned from this internship, and their goals.
