This project dissects audiovisual images of digitization, surveillance, and control found in contemporary documentary films such as Citizenfour (Laura Poitras, US 2014), Democracy (David Bernet, D, FR 2015), and Field of Vision – Project X (Henrik Moltke and Laura Poitras, US 2016). Focusing on aspects of expertise, access, and translational processes, it investigates the production of knowledge in terms of big data and media infrastructures – in, with, and through the moving image. This research relies on theories and methods from textual analysis, discourse analysis, and anthropology, as well as science and technology studies.

Rebecca Puchta studied Literature and Economics at the University of Erfurt and “Studies in European Culture “at the University of Konstanz and Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India. From September 2017 to November 2019, she has been a PhD candidate in the graduate research training program “Configurations of Film” at the Goethe University Frankfurt am Main. In previous seminars, she has taught literature, media, and cultural theory as a tutor, at Salem Kolleg and the University of Vienna. She is an associate member of the DFG Research Group “Media and Participation” based at the University of Konstanz.

Her research interests include media and cultural theories, methods of cultural studies, and governmentality studies. She is currently working on the completion of her dissertation with a focus on knowledge production in documentary post-Snowden.

repu[at]posteo.de