A Will for the Machine: Technology, History, and the Arts

A Conversation in the Humanities in Session Series at the Centre for Humanities Research, part of the Advanced Research Seminar. Hosted under the auspices of the UK-SA Bilateral Digital humanities chair in culture and technics.

Date:

Tuesday 5 August

Time:

2:00pm – 4:00pm

Venue:

The CHR’s Iyatsiba Lab,
66 Greatmore Street, Woodstock
(enter via Regents St)

Speaker:

Professor Mark Sanders

Mark Sanders is Professor of Comparative Literature and English at New York University, and Extraordinary Professor of Afrikaans and Dutch at Stellenbosch University. He is the author of several books, including A Will for the Machine: Computerization, Automation, and the Arts in South AfricaLearning Zulu: A Secret History of Language in South AfricaAmbiguities of Witnessing: Law and Literature in the Time of a Truth Commission; and Complicities: The Intellectual and Apartheid.

In this talk, Mark Sanders will preview his book, A Will for the Machine: Computerization, Automation, and the Arts in South Africa, which appears in early 2026 from the University of Chicago Press. This Humanities in Session event is jointly hosted under the SA-UK Digital Humanities Chair in Culture & Technics, and is moderated by Premesh Lalu.