Ege University 20th Cultural Studies Symposium

AI & Cultural Production

6-8 May 2026

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has rapidly evolved from a tool for technical innovation to a central player in various forms of cultural production. From AI-generated literature and music to machine-learning-assisted visual art and storytelling, the rise of AI in creative fields raises critical questions about authorship, creativity, ethics, and the politics of representation. The 2026 Cultural Studies Symposium seeks to explore how AI is reshaping the cultural landscape, posing new challenges for artists, writers, musicians, and scholars alike. How do AI technologies reconfigure traditional notions of creativity and artistic agency? What are the social, cultural, and political ramifications of AI’s growing role in content creation?

AI’s impact on cultural production is diverse and far-reaching, affecting different creative industries in unique ways. For instance, Kate Crawford’s Atlas of AI: Power, Politics, and the Planetary Costs of Artificial Intelligence (2021) critically examines how AI systems operate within larger frameworks of political, economic, and environmental power. Crawford’s work prompts us to question: How AI-driven creativity reinforces global inequalities, and what are the implications of these new technologies for marginalised communities? On the other hand, Ernest Edmonds’ The Art of Interaction: What HCI Can Learn from Interactive Art (2020) explores how the interactive nature of contemporary art can inform AI’s creative capacities, asking: Can AI-generated works be truly “interactive” like those created by humans, or are they merely mimetic in nature? This perspective invites an inquiry into how AI alters the dynamics of audience engagement and artistic authorship.

Meanwhile, in Ross Goodwin’s ground-breaking AI-generated screenplay Sunspring (2016), a neural network co-authored the script for a short science fiction film. This pioneering work poses critical questions about the future of storytelling in the digital age: How does AI reshape narrative forms and disrupt our expectations of literary creativity? Similarly, Robin Sloan, author of Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore, has experimented with AI as a collaborative partner in writing, blending machine-generated suggestions with human creativity. Nick Montfort also explores this frontier, using AI to generate poetry and experimental narratives, challenging the boundaries of authorship. More recently, Zuzana Husárová and Karel Piorecký’s The Culture of Neural Networks (2024) examines the evolving role of neural network-generated literary texts and artifacts within the broader cultural landscape, proposing the concept of “synthetic textual art” to address the interplay of human and technological actors, historical and theoretical contexts, and the often-misrepresented media discourse surrounding AI’s creative capabilities.

In music, AI systems like David Cope’s EMI (Experiments in Musical Intelligence) have generated compositions in the style of classical composers, questioning the originality and creativity traditionally associated with human artists. Endel, an AI-driven music platform, generates personalised soundscapes based on contextual data, illustrating how AI reshapes not only music production but also the consumption experience. Additionally, Ai-Da, the world’s first AI humanoid artist, creates paintings and sculptures, blending the boundaries between human and machine creativity in the visual arts. These examples demonstrate AI’s transformative potential across a variety of cultural mediums, inviting critical inquiry into the ethical, aesthetic, and social implications of these new forms of production.

The ethical implications of AI-generated images, texts, and music are further examined in Anthony McCosker’s Automating Vision: The Social and Ethical Implications of Image Recognition Technology (2021). Here, McCosker and his colleagues raise critical questions about the cultural biases encoded in machine vision systems and their implications for representation. We ask: What are the consequences of using AI to automate visual cultural production? How do AI technologies replicate or even amplify existing cultural biases, particularly with regard to race, gender, and global inequities? Additionally, Luciano Floridi and Josh Cowls in their article “AI as Agency: A Philosophical Perspective on Machine Agency and Machine Responsibility” (2022) explore the philosophical implications of machine agency and responsibility, challenging the boundaries between human and non-human creators. Their work invites us to consider: What it means for AI to “create”? Can we attribute responsibility and agency to AI systems, or do they remain mere extensions of human intent?

Furthermore, AI-driven translation tools, such as DeepL and Google Translate, have become indispensable to cross-cultural communication, but their influence raises critical questions about language, culture, and ethics. These machine learning-powered systems process large volumes of text efficiently but often fail to capture idiomatic nuances, cultural contexts, and linguistic diversity. This can prioritise dominant languages, marginalise lesser-used tongues, and foster cultural homogenisation. While they offer opportunities for preserving endangered languages and reshaping global publishing, debates persist over their ability to translate creative works—art, poetry, or prose—without losing emotional resonance or cultural depth. Ethical concerns, including the commodification of language and perpetuation of cultural biases, further complicate their adoption. Scholars like Emily M. Bender et al. (2021) and Lynne Bowker (2002) have explored these issues, highlighting the need for critical engagement with the cultural, technical, and political implications of AI-assisted translation in an increasingly interconnected world.

We invite scholars, artists, and practitioners from across disciplines—cultural studies, digital humanities, media studies, art, literature, musicology, and more—to engage in an interdisciplinary dialogue about AI and cultural production. This symposium aims to critically examine how AI technologies both challenge and reinforce existing power structures, as well as explore how they might be leveraged to democratise access to creative tools and transform global cultural production.

Possible Topics Include (but are not limited to):

• Authorship and Creativity in the Age of AI: How do AI-generated works challenge traditional ideas of authorship? Can AI be seen as a co-author or merely a tool? What are the legal and philosophical implications of AI-created content regarding intellectual property?
• AI as a Cultural Actor: To what extent can AI be considered an active participant in cultural production? How does AI influence cultural norms, values, and tastes, and how do these shifts affect global media flows?
• Cultural Bias in AI Algorithms: How do AI technologies replicate or even amplify cultural biases regarding race, gender, and class? How can AI-based systems perpetuate stereotypes in cultural production, and what can be done to mitigate these biases?
• AI and Global Media Industries: How is AI reshaping industries such as publishing, music, and film? We may consider case studies like Ross Goodwin’s AI-generated film Sunspring or David Cope’s AI-composed music, and contemplate on how AI is altering production, distribution, and consumption patterns across different media.
• AI in the Visual Arts and Music: Reflecting on AI-generated art and music, such as the works of Refik Anadol, Mario Klingemann, and Ai-Da, and considering their reception within cultural institutions. What new genres or movements are emerging from the interaction between human artists and AI technologies?
• AI and Storytelling: From Robin Sloan’s AI-assisted fiction writing to Ross Goodwin’s screenplay co-created with AI, how are narrative forms evolving in response to AI-generated text? What new possibilities and limitations does AI present for genres like science fiction, fantasy, or interactive narratives?
• Ethics and AI in Creative Industries: What are the ethical concerns surrounding the integration of AI into creative practices? How can AI be used to democratise access to creative tools, and how might it simultaneously exacerbate inequality within the creative sector?
• AI, Surveillance, and Creative Autonomy: What are the implications of AI-driven surveillance systems for artists, musicians, and writers? How do these systems shape cultural production, and what are the risks of creative commodification in the age of AI?
• AI in Indigenous and Non-Western Cultural Contexts: How are indigenous and non-Western communities engaging with AI in their cultural production? What challenges arise when integrating AI into local traditions and practices?
• AI-Assisted Translations: How do AI-driven tools like DeepL or Google Translate reshape cross-cultural communication? What are the implications for endangered languages, literary translation, and global publishing?

Submission Guidelines:

We invite submissions of 300-word abstracts with 3 to 5 Keywords for 20-minute presentations, as well as proposals for pre-constituted panels (comprising three to four speakers). All proposals should include:

• Presenter’s name, affiliation, and contact information.
• A brief biography (around 150 words).

Please submit your proposals by 15 December 2025 to egecss2026@gmail.com with the subject line “CSS2026 Proposal.” Accepted participants will be notified by 15 January 2026.

We look forward to your submissions and to a vibrant discussion on the future of AI and cultural production!