Syllabus
Critical AI Studies
DHUM 78000 / ENGL 89600
Fall 2025
CUNY Graduate Center
Prof. Matthew K. Gold
Wednesdays 4:15 pm–6:15pm – Hybrid class (see course schedule for modalities)
Course Blog: https://cuny.is/criticalai2025
Course Group: https://cuny.is/criticalai2025-group
Email the class: [email protected]
Faculty
Dr. Matthew K. Gold
[email protected]
Course Description
AI is everywhere and nowhere, a harbinger of techno-utopian promise and automated machinic doom. This course takes a critical, creative, practical, and epistemological approach to the cluster of technologies known as “AI,” exploring how AI functions in practice, what its promise and limitations might be, and how it acts as an imaginary through which political, social, and economic forces are being mustered. Working primarily with language-based AI systems, we will begin by seeking to understand what large language models are and how they work so that we can better critique the things that they do. We will explore how they construe meaning within text and how language is conceptualized and analyzed within them. Through readings from authors such as Kate Crawford, Temnit Gebru, Rita Raley, Matthew G. Kirschenbaum, Meredith Broussard, David Bamman, and others, we will read about the ethical, moral, social, and environmental implications of artificial intelligence. We will also explore how AI is figured in works of literature, TV, and film. Finally, we will play a bit with different types of AI systems to formulate creative-critical interventions. Throughout, we will consider what role the humanities might play in the development of AI technologies, as well as how humanities-based critique can be mobilized to counter and resist the relentless hype-cycle of AI technologies.
Course Resources
This resources page will be updated over the course of the semester.
Learning Objectives
- Students will become acquainted with scholarship and debates the emerging area of “Critical AI Studies”
- Students will gain a basic technological understanding of models and processes underlying common AI technologies
- Students will explore AI from multiple theoretical and critical vantage points
- Students will explore figurations of AI-related technologies in fiction and film
Requirements and Structure:
Students in the course should complete the following work during the semester:
Reading and Discussion (Weekly)
Students should complete weekly readings and activities in advance of the class meeting and should take an active part in class discussions.
Blogging (3 posts)
Students are responsible for writing a minimum of three blog posts on our shared course blog. Posts should be published by the end of the day on Monday so that others have time to read them before class.
Blog posts can take many forms, including:
- reflections on one or more course readings
- responses to class discussions
- posts sharing resources related to class readings and discussions
Students who are not writing blog posts on a given week should comment on and respond to the posts of other students.
Posts on our course blog can be published either publicly or semi-privately through a shared class password. Class discussion prompts (see below) can serve as one of the three required posts.
Presentations and Class Discussion Prompts
- Students will sign up to co-lead class discussions once during the semester. For such sessions, students should circulate, via the course blog, 5-7 open-ended discussion questions for the assigned readings. Please try to tie your questions, whenever possible, to particular moments in our course texts.
- Students will make an informal presentation on their final paper/project during one of the last few classes of the semester. Presentations should be 5-7 minutes and should provide an overview of the paper/project.
Final Paper or Project
Grading
Regular participation in discussions across the range of our face-to-face and online course spaces is essential.
- In-class Participation (including presentations)(35%)
- Blogging and commenting (15%)
- Final project (50%)
Accessibility
It is Graduate Center and CUNY policy to provide appropriate accommodations to students with disabilities. Any student with a disability who may need accommodations in this class is advised to speak directly to Clare Wilson, manager of Student Disability Services, as early in the semester as possible. All discussions will remain confidential. Location: Student Affairs, room 7301; phone: (212) 817-7400; email [email protected].
Accounts
All students should register for accounts on the CUNY Academic Commons and should join our course group. Though we will not use it in class, students may want to sign up for accounts on Zotero, an open-source citation management system, where several groups have been compiling AI-related bibliographies.
Books to Purchase
There are no books to purchase for this course – all texts will be provided to you via links to open educational resources on the web, by e-reserves, or as PDFs available in our course group.
Please check out our course schedule for our list of weekly assignments and readings. Readings marked (PDF) will be made available via the Files section of our course group.
Some assigned articles can be found by logging in through the GC Library homepage. Follow these directions to search for the journal title, and then look up the Year and Issue number. You will have to authenticate against the CUNY identity provider to access the article.
Generative AI / ChatGPT Policy
TBD
Policy from previous semester: Students may not use GenAI tools in this course to produce course materials or assignments in whole or in part. All work you submit for this course toward completion of course requirements must be your own original work done specifically for this course and without substantive assistance from others, including GenAI. Work you’ve completed for previous courses or are developing for other courses this term also should not be submitted for this course. If you have any questions or doubts, please ask.
