Wenzel Mehnert
"Things to Come…" – Exploring Future Worlds
Seminar, English/Deutsch, 2 SWS, 2 ECTS
Monday, 16-20 h, every 14 days, 7 dates: 23.4., 7.5., 21.5., 4.6., 18.6., 2.7., 16.7.2018, Grunewaldstr. 2-5, room 122

The idea of what the future will bring is already part of our cultural memory. Through novels, films, series and other forms of Science Fiction we get a glance into the everyday life of tomorrow and get an opportunity to reflect on it. Therefore contemporary Science Fiction is to be seen as a reflection of the hopes and fears we are confronted with today rather than a window into the future. From this perspective, the idea of the future becomes a participatory discourse that actors strategically create while others tactically challenge it. It becomes a contested ground and the idea of the future as „These are the things to come“ slowly shifts to an „Do we want those things to come“? Future becomes democratized. In the seminar we will challenge our shared future visions and ask for possible implications on our everyday life. Drawing from methods of design fiction, ethnography and future-research, we speculate about the implication of foreseeable innovations and technologies on our society. Through that, we will create our own „thick futures“ and anticipate changes and alternatives to create artefacts and stories out of a possible future world.

Leistungsanforderungen für den unbenoteten Studium-Generale-Schein: regular and active attendance.

Voraussetzung für die Teilnahme: a high interest in future trends and science fiction plus a sense of nerdism.

Focus: Forschen und Denken, Transformieren, Experimentieren

Wenzel Mehnert arbeitet seit 2016 als Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter an der Universität der Künste im Fachbereich Audiovisuelles Storytelling. Hier forscht er zu der Rolle von Zukunftsnarrationen und antizipiert mit Hilfe von spekulativen Methoden den Einfluss von technologischen Innovationen auf die Gesellschaft. In der Lehre liegt sein Fokus auf der Schnittstelle zwischen qualitativer Sozialforschung und AV-Formaten sowie visueller Anthropologie.