Truths of fact and digital memory: processes of preserving facts in the Information Society

• Grant number: 24/00714-8
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Post-doctor
• Start date: February 01, 2025
• End date: January 31, 2026
• Field of knowledge: Interdisciplinary Subjects
• Principal Investigator: Hélio Rebello Cardoso Júnior
• Grantee: Kelly Janaína Souza da Silva
• Supervisor: Maria Teresa Pimentel Peito Cruz Braganca de Miranda
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências e Letras (FCL-ASSIS). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Assis. Assis , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal
• Associated to the scholarship: 22/09768-8 - Production's processes of historical truth in digital media & post-truth times: a dialogue between Arendt and theory of History, BP.PD

Abstract

One of the great challenges of our time is the impact of digitalization on our society. All over the world, people's lives are shaped by digital services and artificial intelligence. What are the consequences of the ever-increasing digitization? What ethical, political, legal, economic or even moral effects does the digital transformation have on our society? The current project consists of a proposal for a research internship at Universidade Nova de Lisboa and aims to discuss the consequences of exponential technological expansion on the preservation and legitimacy of so-called factual truths based on Hannah Arendt's concept, in particular, on the impact of "information society" on memory preservation. Considering that the current technological paradigm presented us with the technique as a complete reformulator of memory artifacts, the present work aims to analyze what impacts arise from a paradigm in which memories are instantiated as immune to temporality and, therefore, the so-called digital memory is established as a standard of preservation, since the current expansion of technological means and formats already conditions the very elaboration of present documents. The theme of digital preservation concerning factual truths, thus, emerges from the dominance of the electronic medium in everyday practices and its observed transversality in practically all dimensions of life. In the field of Humanities, in particular, it is important to reflect and debate the influence of technologies and media on production, dissemination, communication and, in our research, especially, preservation of historical knowledge, beyond a purely methodological and technical, also highlighting the paradigmatic transition regarding historical making itself. Therefore, the research will comprise interfaces between historical and philosophical work and Digital Humanities.