On April 15-17, 2026, members of the Deep Culture project participated in the inaugural STS NL Conference at the University of Twente within the track “Deep Learning and Culture”. This panel, organized by Louis Ravn, Anna Schjøtt Hansen, Dasha Simons, Paula Helm, and Tobias Blanke, exploring the dynamic relationship between deep learning technologies and cultural practices. The perspective moved beyond the narrative of deep learning as a homogenizing force, instead exploring its productive potentials and the frictions that arise at their intersection.
The presentations covered a wide range of topics: the representation of marginalized voices in AI systems, the metaphorical language of AI memes, the cultural boundaries revealed by iterative image prompting, the epistemic shifts in RAG-based search, the high-dimensional semantic transductions of multimodal LLMs, and the normative governance of sensitive public discourse by LLMs.
We warmly thank all applicants and participants for their engaging contributions and lively discussions. Special thanks to the presenters: Chloe Papadopoulou (University of Amsterdam), Orsola M. Borrini (University of Amsterdam), Bokar N’Diaye (University of Amsterdam), Michael Castelle (University of Warwick), Mariam Khaled (Aarhus University), Delfina S. Martinez Pandiani (University of Amsterdam), Sal Hagen (University of Amsterdam), and Marton Gosztonyi (Eötvös Loránd Science University – Institute of Empirical Studies, representing the rest of the team: Ildikó Barna, Renáta Németh, and Haseeb Raza).
The abstracts of the presentations in PDF format can be found here.
