Uber and Transmission

Introduction

Precarious labor, venture capital, global workers, indiscriminate networks, platform capitalism: these are some of the terms used to describe - - or, at least, point to - - the new configurations of work, capital, communication, and identity common to the age of "data bodies."   In this book, we bring Hari Kunzru's 2004 novel, Transmission, into intimate contact with the startup company and Silicon Valley darling, Uber.   In its focus on how networks - - of people, money, information, and material - - both open up and foreclose possibilities of freedom and self, Kunzru's novel grapples with the rise of network capitalism and seems to predict the birth of companies like Uber.  Our goal in this book is two-fold: how can a novel, Transmission, help us to understand new entities like Uber?  Conversely, how can a company like Uber, as it pioneers new models of autonomy and inequality, deepen our understanding of Kunzru's fiction?  This book reflects our humble efforts to stage a meeting between literature and history.

English 602 | Fall 2016 | San Francisco State University


 

 

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