Lindsay Weinberg and Anish Vanaik: Invited Eye – Astroveillance and the Digital Complaint Educators and students have long experienced surveillance as part of their working and learning conditions. However, more attention to student surveillance over faculty in higher education, including in the wake of rising authoritarianism in the U.S., is urgently needed. This talk offers an examination of how universities in Indiana have responded to laws that seek to enact new regimes of surveillance over university classroom speech. It draws on a critical interface analysis of the complaint software and procedures universities in Indiana are deploying in order to comply with Senate Enrolled Act 202, an Indiana law passed in 2024 that requires faculty to “foster a culture of free inquiry, free expression, and intellectual diversity.” It investigates how these complaint infrastructures attempt to incorporate demands for partisan surveillance into routine organizational practice, with significant legal and pedagogical implications for students and faculty.Furthermore, while proponents of the law argue that it emerges in response to bottom-up demands from conservative students for greater university and teacher accountability, this talk will argue that this is a manufactured justification resulting in ”astroveillance.” Astroveillance conceptually links together the phenomenon of astroturfing, meaning efforts by elites to mobilize masses of people in order to present an issue as “grassroots,” and sousveillance as a form of “watching from below.” Through astroveillance, conservative political elites attempt to recruit students into roles as partisan monitors and informants against faculty. The talk will conclude with a discussion of various resistance tactics to and through these infrastructures, including sabotage, counter-conduct pedagogies, lawsuits, and refusal, emphasizing that systems of surveillance in education are never totalizing or inevitable.SpeakersLindsay Weinberg is a clinical associate professor in the John Martinson Honors College at Purdue University. Her research and teaching are at the intersection of science and technology studies, media studies, and feminist studies, with a focus on the social and ethical implications of digital technology. Her book, Smart University: Student Surveillance in the Digital Age (John Hopkins University Press, 2024) examines the proliferation of digital tools for higher education governance, and their impacts on marginalized people within and beyond the university’s walls.Anish Vanaik is a clinical associate professor in the John Martinson Honors College and a historian of South Asia with a particular focus on the political economy of cities. His book, Possessing the City, employs insights from Marxist geographers to study the ways in which urban property relations shaped the old city of Delhi. He continues to research histories of commerce in colonial and post-colonial Delhi. Another area of interest has been portrayals of the Black Lives Matter Movement in political cartoons. He’s currently working with collaborators on a book project that takes up that very issue.Joining informationYou will receive the details to log into the call in a confirmation message from Eventbrite after you have registered successfully. If you don't see that message, please check your spam folder or contact us. Email MHSES Events For any enquiries concerning this event, please email MHSES Events.Privacy policy Tags Digital Education Research centres, groups and networks Research events Conferences, seminars and lectures Nov 05 2025 13.00 - 14.00 Lindsay Weinberg and Anish Vanaik: Invited Eye – Astroveillance and the Digital Complaint An examination of how universities in Indiana have responded to laws that seek to enact new regimes of surveillance over university classroom speech. Online (Teams) Book free tickets on Eventbrite
Lindsay Weinberg and Anish Vanaik: Invited Eye – Astroveillance and the Digital Complaint Educators and students have long experienced surveillance as part of their working and learning conditions. However, more attention to student surveillance over faculty in higher education, including in the wake of rising authoritarianism in the U.S., is urgently needed. This talk offers an examination of how universities in Indiana have responded to laws that seek to enact new regimes of surveillance over university classroom speech. It draws on a critical interface analysis of the complaint software and procedures universities in Indiana are deploying in order to comply with Senate Enrolled Act 202, an Indiana law passed in 2024 that requires faculty to “foster a culture of free inquiry, free expression, and intellectual diversity.” It investigates how these complaint infrastructures attempt to incorporate demands for partisan surveillance into routine organizational practice, with significant legal and pedagogical implications for students and faculty.Furthermore, while proponents of the law argue that it emerges in response to bottom-up demands from conservative students for greater university and teacher accountability, this talk will argue that this is a manufactured justification resulting in ”astroveillance.” Astroveillance conceptually links together the phenomenon of astroturfing, meaning efforts by elites to mobilize masses of people in order to present an issue as “grassroots,” and sousveillance as a form of “watching from below.” Through astroveillance, conservative political elites attempt to recruit students into roles as partisan monitors and informants against faculty. The talk will conclude with a discussion of various resistance tactics to and through these infrastructures, including sabotage, counter-conduct pedagogies, lawsuits, and refusal, emphasizing that systems of surveillance in education are never totalizing or inevitable.SpeakersLindsay Weinberg is a clinical associate professor in the John Martinson Honors College at Purdue University. Her research and teaching are at the intersection of science and technology studies, media studies, and feminist studies, with a focus on the social and ethical implications of digital technology. Her book, Smart University: Student Surveillance in the Digital Age (John Hopkins University Press, 2024) examines the proliferation of digital tools for higher education governance, and their impacts on marginalized people within and beyond the university’s walls.Anish Vanaik is a clinical associate professor in the John Martinson Honors College and a historian of South Asia with a particular focus on the political economy of cities. His book, Possessing the City, employs insights from Marxist geographers to study the ways in which urban property relations shaped the old city of Delhi. He continues to research histories of commerce in colonial and post-colonial Delhi. Another area of interest has been portrayals of the Black Lives Matter Movement in political cartoons. He’s currently working with collaborators on a book project that takes up that very issue.Joining informationYou will receive the details to log into the call in a confirmation message from Eventbrite after you have registered successfully. If you don't see that message, please check your spam folder or contact us. Email MHSES Events For any enquiries concerning this event, please email MHSES Events.Privacy policy Tags Digital Education Research centres, groups and networks Research events Conferences, seminars and lectures Nov 05 2025 13.00 - 14.00 Lindsay Weinberg and Anish Vanaik: Invited Eye – Astroveillance and the Digital Complaint An examination of how universities in Indiana have responded to laws that seek to enact new regimes of surveillance over university classroom speech. Online (Teams) Book free tickets on Eventbrite
Nov 05 2025 13.00 - 14.00 Lindsay Weinberg and Anish Vanaik: Invited Eye – Astroveillance and the Digital Complaint An examination of how universities in Indiana have responded to laws that seek to enact new regimes of surveillance over university classroom speech.
