Digital Occultism

Description

The histories of technology and the occult have long been intertwined, meddling with our political imaginaries and peddling knowledge from beyond. In a post-vibe shift era, esoteric vocabularies have become an unspoken grammar for interpreting a technological present that appears increasingly cryptic. Why do we imagine algorithms as autonomous entities, place our faith in technological prophecies, or believe that memes can manifest political realities? Digital Occultism traces the occult logics of memetic circulation from early internet cultures to contemporary platform environments, investigating how fictions acquire material force, how politics operate as psychological warfare, and how desires are engineered through algorithmic feedback. What happens when the stories we tell about technology begin to shape the realities they describe? Drawing on Deleuze and Guattari, contemporary media theory, and the entangled histories of esotericism and modern technologies, the course examines how occult knowledge is decoded, mutated, and reassembled within digital culture. Through the lens of meme magick, hyperstition, network spirituality, and schizoposting, we investigate how belief and fiction become constitutive forces within technoculture, shaping collective imaginaries and opening up new political horizons. Readings, discussions, and practical exercises invite students to critically engage with the occult epistemologies operative within contemporary media environments and to consider their implications for artistic practice and the production of reality. The course will feature guest lectures by Karin Valis and Günseli Yalcinkaya.

Vortragende