Dark Side of the Digital conference plenary speaker, Micha Cárdenas, doesn’t simply query the ‘dark side’ of digital enthusiasm through her scholarship, she actively confronts the intersections of bodies, technologies, movement and politics through performance. Milwaukee residents (and visitors!) and UWM students, faculty, and staff will have the opportunity to do the same during the “Building Local Autonomy Networks” workshop and performance that she will organize during the conference. In Micha’s words:

The Autonets workshop will engage participants in a discussion, using Theater of the Oppressed dance and performance exercises, of how we can form local networks of autonomy and solidarity in order to create community based responses to violences, which are personal, gendered or state sponsored. Join us for a four-hour workshop that will culminate in a performance where we will use Theater of the Oppressed to embody community based responses to violence. The workshop will invite participants to consider these questions: what kinds of violence you face on a daily basis and how can we respond as a community to prevent these forms of violence, with or without digital technologies. No experience is necessary to participate in the workshop and performance, as both rely on what our bodies already know.

Autonets: We Already Know and We Don’t Yet Know, Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics VIII Encuentro, São Paulo, Brazil, January 2013, with Micha Cárdenas, Alessandra Renzi, Frantz Jerome, Benjamin Lundberg, Lily Mengesha, Aisha Jordan, Joana Fittipaldi and Tomaz Capobanco, photos by Macarena Gomez-Barris

The workshop will take place on Thursday, May 2nd from 9:00-1:00 at the Hefter Conference Center.  The workshop participants will then perform at 8:00 at the Pabst Brewery on Thursday, May 2nd. For more information, check out the flyer or email c21[at]uwm[dot]edu