{"id":2190,"date":"2025-09-22T10:20:24","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T10:20:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/coda.letras.up.pt\/brkcode\/?p=2190"},"modified":"2026-05-26T14:28:42","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T14:28:42","slug":"conference","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/coda.letras.up.pt\/brkcode\/conference\/","title":{"rendered":"Breaking the Code: Hacktivating Non-Normative Algorithms | International Conference \u2013 18\u201319 June 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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CONFIRMED KEYNOTE SPEAKERS<\/b><\/h2>

Esther Monz\u00f3-Nebot (Universitat Jaume I)<\/strong><\/h4>

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In her keynote, \u201cHacktivating Translation and Interpreting: Lucidity in Technofeudal Culture Wars\u201d, Monz\u00f3-Nebot critically examines how machine translation and language technologies are framed as neutral solutions and how this neutrality masks new forms of power, extraction, and exclusion.<\/span><\/p>

Drawing on language rights, translation activism, and feminist and postmonolingual perspectives, her work powerfully resonates with the conference theme Error 403 \u2013 Critical Refusals.<\/p>

Tatiana Bazzichelli (Disruption Network Lab, Berlin)<\/strong><\/h4>

\"\"Founder and director of the Disruption Network Lab, Bazzichelli has been a central voice in debates around whistleblowing, networked disruption, art, and activism. Her work critically examines how power operates across digital cultures, and how artistic and activist practices can intervene in technological systems from within.
This keynote speaks directly to the conference\u2019s focus on refusal, disobedience, and non-normative algorithmic practices.<\/p>

Miguel Carvalhais (FBAUP)<\/strong><\/h4>

\"\"Professor of Design and Dean of the Faculty of Fine Arts at the University of Porto, Carvalhais works at the intersection of computation, sound, and artistic practice. His research and artistic work approach computation as a cultural and aesthetic condition, shaping how form, process, and perception emerge in contemporary art.<\/p>

His keynote will combine critical reflection with practice-based insights, drawing from his ongoing work in computational and sound art.<\/p>

Mark Amerika (University of Boulder, Colorado)<\/strong><\/h4>

\"\"Mark Amerika has exhibited his art in many venues including the Whitney Biennial, the Denver Art Museum, the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, ZKM, the Walker Art Center, the Marlborough Gallery in Barcelona, and Casa Comum at the University of Porto.
In 2009-2010, The National Museum of Contemporary Art in Athens, Greece, featured Amerika\u2019s comprehensive retrospective exhibition entitled UNREALTIME including his groundbreaking works of Internet art GRAMMATRON and FILMTEXT as well as his feature-length work of mobile cinema, Immobilit\u00e9. In 2012, Amerika released his transmedia narrative, Museum of Glitch Aesthetics (MOGA), a multi-platform net artwork commissioned by Abandon Normal Devices in conjunction with the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The MOGA project has since been remixed for Amerika\u2019s solo exhibition \u201cGlitch. Click. Thunk\u201d at the University of Hawaii Art Galleries and \u201cGlitch Mix: not an error,\u201d which took place in Havana, Cuba, at the Estudio Figueroa-Vives and the Norwegian Embassy to Cuba.<\/p>

About Dream Factory:<\/strong>
Dream Factory is Mark Amerika\u2019s newest artwork, made in collaboration with Will Luers and Chad Mossholder. In this 30-minute AI-driven cinema work, the artists use poetic and theoretical language in real-time call-and-response sessions with AI systems to coax artificial figures into being. Unfolding across five movements, the work traces these figures as they evolve from ghostly apparitions into entities that speak directly to viewers in modulated human voices, raising urgent questions about creativity and human expression in the age of machine intelligence.<\/p>

Accommodation suggestions<\/strong><\/h2>

Tuela Porto Hotel<\/strong> (3-star, 50 rooms) \u2013 5 minutes<\/em>
Rua Arq. Marques Da Silva, 200 \u2013 4150-483 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 22 6194100 \u2013 Landline: (+351) 22 6194160
Email: porto@hoteisfenix.com<\/a><\/p>

Boavista Guest House<\/strong> (3-star) \u2013 10 minutes<\/em>
Rua da Boavista, 667 \u2013 4050-110 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 92 40 41 500 \u2013 Landline: (+351) 22 202 60 86
Email: info@boavistaguesthouse.com<\/a><\/p>

Hotel Vice-Rei<\/strong> (2-star) \u2013 5 minutes<\/em>
Rua de J\u00falio Dinis, 779 \u2013 4050-326 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 22 543 0120
Email: geral@hotelvicerei.com<\/a><\/p>

HF F\u00e9nix Porto Hotel<\/strong> (4-star, 100 rooms) \u2013 5 minutes<\/em>
Rua Gon\u00e7alo Sampaio, 282 \u2013 4150-365 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 22 6194100 \u2013 Fax: (+351) 22 6194160
Email: porto@hoteisfenix.com<\/a><\/p>

HF Ipanema Porto Hotel<\/strong> (4-star, 100 rooms) \u2013 5 minutes<\/em>
Rua do Campo Alegre, 156\/172 \u2013 4150-169 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 22 6194100 \u2013 Fax: (+351) 22 6194160
Email: porto@hoteisfenix.com<\/a><\/p>

HF Ipanema Park Hotel<\/strong> (5-star, 50 rooms) \u2013 20 minutes<\/em>
Rua de Serralves, 124 \u2013 4150-702 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 22 6194100 \u2013 Fax: (+351) 22 6194160
Email: porto@hoteisfenix.com<\/a><\/p>

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Other hotels near the Faculty<\/strong><\/h4>

Hotel Douro<\/strong> (3-star)
Rua da Medita\u00e7\u00e3o, 71 \u2013 4150-487 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 226 001 122 \u2013 Fax: (+351) 226 001 090<\/p>

Quality Hotel Portus Cale Porto<\/strong> (3-star)
Avenida da Boavista, 1060 \u2013 4100-113 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 226 083 900 \u2013 Fax: (+351) 226 083 906<\/p>

Porto Pal\u00e1cio Hotel<\/strong> (5-star)
Av. da Boavista, 1269 \u2013 4100-130 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 226 086 600 \u2013 Fax: (+351) 226 091 467
Email: reservaspph@sonae.pt<\/a> | portopalaciohotel@sonae.pt<\/a>
Website: www.hotelportopalacio.com<\/a><\/p>

Sheraton Porto Hotel & Spa<\/strong> (5-star)
Rua Tenente Valadim, 146 \u2013 4100-476 Porto \u2013 Portugal
Phone: (+351) 220 404 000
Email: sheraton.porto@sheraton.com<\/a>
Website: www.sheratonporto.com<\/a><\/p>

CALL FOR PAPERS<\/b><\/h2>

Breaking the Code: Hacktivating Non-Normative Algorithms<\/b>
<\/b> International Conference \u2013 18\u201319 June 2026<\/b>
<\/b> Theme 2026: Error 403 \u2013 Critical Refusals<\/b><\/p>

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Porto, Faculty of Arts and Humanities (FLUP) + online<\/span>
<\/span> An output of the BRKCODE Project (DARIAH-EU), in partnership with the\u00a0Electronic Literature Organization<\/a><\/span><\/p>

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What does it mean to err \u2013 to glitch, to refuse efficiency, to disobey system logics?<\/span><\/p>

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The inaugural conference of <\/span>Breaking the Code: Hacktivating Non-Normative Algorithms <\/span><\/i>adopts the theme <\/span>Error 403 \u2013 Critical Refusals<\/span><\/i>, inviting scholars, artists, and those working across research and artistic practice to treat error as a critical condition, to read glitch as resistant gesture, and to approach refusal and deviation as an opening to new epistemologies and creative forms.<\/span><\/p>

We proceed from the recognition that algorithms, often presented as neutral and universal, operate as normative structures that shape and constrain identities. They codify and reproduce biases linked to gender, race, class, and sexuality while masking these operations through appeals to efficiency and objectivity. To address these dynamics, we draw on Judith Butler\u2019s performativity, Kimberl\u00e9 Crenshaw\u2019s intersectionality, and Donna Haraway\u2019s situated knowledges, in dialogue with Critical Code Studies (Marino, 2020; Montfort et al. 2013) and Creative Digital Humanities (<\/span>Rettberg and Saum-Pascual 2020).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

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Within this frame, error becomes method. Glitch practices, acts of critical hacking, and algorithmic disruptions, such as livecoded improvisations, are not accidents to correct but practices that surface and expose what systems obscure. As Legacy Russell notes in the <\/span>Glitch Feminism Manifesto<\/span><\/i> (2020), \u201cto glitch is to embrace malfunction, and to embrace malfunction is in and of itself an expression that starts with \u2018no\u2019.\u201d Crucially, \u201cmalfunction\u201d here does not denote total breakdown but deviation from normative scripts: a \u201cnonperformance\u201d and a \u201crefusal\u201d that resists the demand for seamless operability. In that spirit, the conference foregrounds artistic and scholarly interventions that make visible algorithmic exclusions, challenge normative frameworks, and reimagine alternative futures for digital culture.<\/span><\/p>

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In doing so,<\/span> Error 403 \u2013 Critical Refusals<\/span><\/i> seeks to establish a critical platform linking intersectional research with creative disobedience, while advancing explorations of algorithmic glitch aesthetics and pedagogies. Through this platform, the conference positions itself at the crossroads of theory and practice, inviting dialogue across critical analysis and experimental making.<\/span><\/p>

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Topics of Interest<\/b><\/p>

We welcome contributions that respond to the theme through conceptual analysis, artistic intervention, or pedagogical experimentation. Areas of particular interest include:<\/span><\/p>