Lively robots: robotic technologies in COVID-19

In this article, we contribute to robot geographies by developing the idea of robotic 'liveliness' in the context of their increased use during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our framing draws on new materialism, and builds the idea of liveliness by considering robots' agential capacities in...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Social & cultural geography 2022-11, Vol.23 (9), p.1220-1237
Main Authors: Sumartojo, Shanti, Lugli, Daniele
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
care
COVID-19
cuidado
côté vivant
Deployment
emerging technology
Liveliness
Materialism
new materialism
nouveau matérialisme
nuevo materialismo
Pandemics
Robotics
Robots
technologies émergentes
tecnología emergente
vivacidad
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Summary:In this article, we contribute to robot geographies by developing the idea of robotic 'liveliness' in the context of their increased use during the COVID-19 pandemic. Our framing draws on new materialism, and builds the idea of liveliness by considering robots' agential capacities in three different ways: as apparently autonomous technologies; as inorganic and mechanical bodies; and as perpetually unfinished and contingent things. We examine a range of examples of their deployment during the pandemic to speculate on the potential for robots to emerge as 'caring subjects' via this notion of liveliness, and argue that it offers an approach that can contribute to critiques about their use in 'caring' roles, an application which is rapidly developing in the area of social robotics. We contend that this claim to 'care' within robotics is one reason why exploration and framing of their liveliness is needed.
ISSN:1464-9365
1470-1197
DOI:10.1080/14649365.2021.1921245