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Data Society
The Data Society research programme aims to advance the studies of digitalisation and datafication as pivotal change agents. We seek not only to understand these change agents but also to apply this understanding to effect positive social change. The programme focuses on the social and cultural issues arising from data-centric technological development.
There are advantages and huge potential but also possible harm and great challenges with digitalisation and datafication: the program researchers tackle the complex issues of our data society
Maria Engberg, Director
Our research
Digital technologies are increasingly present in everyday life, forming part of the way we live and experience the world. The need to understand digitalisation and datafication in ways that are not uniquely through a technological lens is growing.
The Data Society program consolidates and develops research that addresses the societal challenge of digitalisation across society. It is an interdisciplinary program that comprises researchers from social sciences, humanities and technology, as well as the arts and design.
We critically and constructively engage in and advance research on aspects of digitalisation and datafication, today and for the future. We engage in multidisciplinary studies that investigate how these processes play out in people’s everyday lives, in communities, and in private and public organisations and institutions, with an initial focus on digital culture, datafied health and digital civics.
Our research questions include:
How do processes of digitalisation appear and operate at different societal levels, causing different and sometimes conflicting expectations and experiences?
What digital methods can be developed to open up new fields of study and develop deeper understanding of how digital technologies operate to structure the world around them?
In what ways can our research build on as well as challenge existing solution-driven practices to how we create a sustainable digitalised society?
Our objectives:
- construct a cross-disciplinary theoretical trajectory that moves beyond disciplinary boundaries;
- advance and develop methodologies that bridge social sciences, humanities, and technological sciences; and
- explore and develop new forms of practice-based research and contact zones for collaboration.
Researchers, publications and projects
Data Society is an interdisciplinary programme that comprises researchers from a wide range of academic fields within social science, humanities, technology and the arts and design.
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Staff
Patrik Berander - Program director/Senior lecturer
patrik.berander@mau.se -
Staff
Martin Berg - Professor
martin.berg@mau.se -
JBStaff
Jay David Bolter - Guest professor
jay.david.bolter@mau.se -
SBStaff
Suzan Boztepe - Senior lecturer
suzan.boztepe@mau.se -
ÒCStaff
Òscar Coromina Rodriguez - Senior lecturer
oscar.coromina@mau.se -
Staff
Maria Engberg - Associate Professor/Senior lecturer
maria.engberg@mau.se -
KGStaff
Katarzyna Gruszka - Postdoc
katarzyna.gruszka@mau.se -
Staff
Andreas Jacobsson - Head of department/Associate Professor
andreas.jacobsson@mau.se -
Staff
Susan Kozel - Professor
susan.kozel@mau.se -
HLStaff
Henrik Svarrer Larsen - Senior lecturer
henrik.svarrer.larsen@mau.se -
Staff
Sara Leckner - Senior lecturer/Head of unit/Associate Professor
sara.leckner@mau.se -
PLStaff
Per Linde - Head of department/Senior lecturer
per.linde@mau.se -
Staff
Elisabet M. Nilsson - Associate Professor/Senior lecturer
elisabet.nilsson@mau.se -
Staff
Carl Johan Orre - Program director/Senior lecturer
carljohan.orre@mau.se -
Staff
Sven Packmohr - Program director/Senior lecturer
sven.packmohr@mau.se -
Staff
Erik Pineiro - Program director/Senior lecturer
erik.pineiro@mau.se -
Staff
Pille Pruulmann Vengerfeldt - Professor
pille.pruulmann.vengerfeldt@mau.se -
Staff
Bo Reimer - Professor
bo.reimer@mau.se -
Staff
Ulrika Sjöberg - Professor
ulrika.sjoberg@mau.se -
Staff
Jakob Svensson - Professor
jakob.svensson@mau.se -
Staff
Jason Tucker - Associate senior lecturer
jason.tucker@mau.se -
Staff
Josepha Wessels - Associate Professor/Senior lecturer
josepha.wessels@mau.se
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2023 | Collection (editor)
The Digital Reading Condition
Maria Engberg, Iben Have, Birgitte Stougaard Pedersen
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2023 | Chapter in book
Reading and Materiality: Conditions of Digital Reading
Maria Engberg
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2023 | Article in journal
Artificial intelligence is an oxymoron: The importance of an organic body when facing unknown situations as they unfold in the present moment
Jakob Svensson
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2022 | Chapter in book
Deltagande netnografi
Martin Berg
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2022 | Conference paper
Rethinking the Public Sector : Design storytelling as a catalyst for organizational transformation
Suzan Boztepe
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2022 | Conference paper
Redesigning the curriculum : A participatory design approach
Suzan Boztepe
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2022 | Conference paper
Enhancing the Digital Transformation of Sports Arenas
Ebba Lagergren, Sven Packmohr
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2022 | Article in journal
Barriers to Digital Higher Education Teaching and How to Overcome Them: Lessons Learned during the COVID-19 Pandemic
Nicole Draxler-Weber, Sven Packmohr, Henning Brink
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2022 | Article in journal
Students´ Experiences of Participation in a Research Team: Evaluation of a Research-based Teaching Activity in HigherEducation
Elisabeth Carlson, Martin Stigmar, Maria Engberg, Magnus Falk, Maria Magdalena Stollenwerk, Petri Gudmundsson, Karin Enskär
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2022 | Chapter in book
Questioning the business–humanities divide in media studies: A reformulation of the administrative–critical distinction in stakeholder collaboration
David Mathieu, Niklas Alexander Chimirri, Jelena Kleut, Pille Pruulmann-Vengerfeldt
Research projects
Our projects address wide-ranging questions that cannot be addressed within one discipline or with one set of methodological approaches. Some of Data Society's research is conducted by teams or individual researchers within the faculty financed research time. These are our current projects with external financing.
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Research project
Swedish Riksdag 1867–2022: An Ecosystem of Linked Open Data
fredrik.noren@mau.se -
Research project
Nordic Fabulation Network
jason.tucker@mau.se -
Research project
Swedish Parliamentary Debates
fredrik.noren@mau.se -
Research project
Modern Times 1936
fredrik.noren@mau.se -
Research project
AI and the everyday political-economy of global health
jason.tucker@mau.se -
Research project
Navigating visibility in contexts of state-sanctioned homophobia: development actors and LGBTQ rights defenders in Uganda and Russia
jakob.svensson@mau.se -
Research project
Working with Algorithmic Colleagues: Expectations and Experiences of Automated Decision-Making
martin.berg@mau.se -
Research project
Knowing From Somewhere: On Modes and Sites of Knowledge Production with Hacker Communities in the Field of Internet of Things
maria.hellstrom.reimer@mau.se -
Research project
International Ideas at UNESCO: Digital Approaches to Global Conceptual History
fredrik.noren@mau.se -
Research project
Re-humanising Automated Decision-Making
martin.berg@mau.se -
Research project
Welfare State Analytics: Text Mining and Modeling Swedish Politics, Media & C ulture, 1945-1989 (WeStAc)
fredrik.noren@mau.se
The Data Society Fellowship Program
The Data Society fellowship program is a short-stay guest research program. We have two kinds of fellowships: one junior and one senior fellowship. We expect our fellows to stay 2-4 weeks; however, other arrangements can be made depending on the proposed activities.
A senior fellow has a few years of experience in research and often holds a more senior position (in academia, this would probably most likely be an Associate Professor/Reader and up). You may also be a professional who works outside of academia (e.g. at a company, public authority or as an independent researcher or practitioner in a field relevant to DS research).
A junior fellow is likely a PhD student, a recent PhD or someone otherwise at the beginning of their research career, or a junior professional working outside academia with relevant Data Society research.
Apply
The Data Society Research program at Malmö University was established in 2019, as part of a larger effort to consolidate strong research at the university. Data Society research program focuses on advancing the field of digitalization studies, broadly defined. The program aims to advance critical studies of digitalisation and datafication as pivotal change agents. The program’s researchers work on the social and cultural issues arising from data-centric technological development.
Your contribution
Guest researchers will be asked to contribute to one or more of the following program activities depending on their proposed program and the length of their stay:
- Conduct their proposed activities, and share the work in an appropriate way (seminar, workshop, installation, event, publications)
- Collaborate on a research project with program researchers
- Co-organize and/or participate in Data Society seminars, workshops, or conferences.
- Initiate projects or prepare research applications with program researchers
- Academic writing, single-authored or co-authored with a program researcher. All fellowship publications must be listed in Malmö University’s institutional repository for publications (DIVA) as a Data Society-affiliated publication.
All fellows will be asked to host or be part of at least one public Data Society event during their stay and to write a brief public report about their stay within one month of departure.
Program objectives
- To actively contribute to the research environment in the Data Society research program.
- To enable research staff and doctoral students at the department to work with leading academics and professionals from Sweden or elsewhere.
- To give fellows an opportunity to collaborate in joint research with program researchers
- To develop and promote links with other institutions, companies, and organizations in Sweden and abroad.
What we offer
We offer a stipend, travel costs (details will be discussed if you are offered a fellowship), and accommodation during the stay in Malmö. Unless otherwise agreed, the fellowship is not remote/virtual. The fellow is expected to come to Malmö, Sweden.
We do not cover salary.
You can apply for additional funding to support project costs in the application.
You may suggest your own dates for the visit. Activities can start at the earliest two weeks after you have been accepted to the fellowship. Please note that we cannot accommodate researchers during the summer, June 20-August 20 unless otherwise agreed.
How to apply
You must get in touch with one of the Data Society-affiliated researchers before you apply, in order to ensure that your project fits the Data Society research directions or research agenda of affiliated projects.
We have an ongoing application. Please contact maria.engberg@mau.se after application to get information about decision-making process.
Advisory Board
The Advisory Board helps us continuously strengthen our position and outreach nationally and internationally.
Members
External members
Malmö University members
Previous seminars and events
Data Society seminar series
in English:
25 February, 2021
Mau Play: Interpretive Sociology and Computational Methods - Simon Lindgren
15 October, 2020
Mau Play: Participatory engagement in museums - Pille Pruulmann-Vengerfeldt
Storytelling of the Future seminars (Framtidens berättande)
– a collaboration between Malmö University's Data Society and Region Skåne's department of culture
25 May, 2021
Mau Play: Sara Cronberg and Stefan Stanišić discuss hybrid storytelling (in Swedish)
18 May, 2021
23 March, 2021
15 December, 2020
Mau Play: Sara Granér in conversation with Thomas Alm, about cartoons and stories (in Swedish)
18 November, 2020
20 October, 2020
Mau Play: Kalle Lind in conversation with Maria Engberg, about podcasts (in Swedish)