Season 2 | Episode 4: "Surveilling"

Are you being watched right now? And if so, what are you going to do about it? In this episode of Zeugma, Beck Wise explores the world of surveillance, from robot baristas to naked body scanners, and the ways people respond to these increasingly prevalent, and increasingly invasive, technologies.

You can stream the episode below; you can also download it via iTunes and LibSyn.

Image credit: TSA Communication Plate by Evan Roth. Licensed under Creative Commons BY-NC-NA.

Our first segment introduces you to one of the creepiest technologies on campus, an automated coffee robot that seems like it's making your caffeination process just a little bit easier -- but turns out to be keeping, and sharing, more of your personal information than you might be comfortable with. And we talk with Simone Browne, a professor of African and African Diaspora Studies at the University of Texas, about the raced and gendered experience of surveillance -- and about the ways that surveilled communities use social media and art to turn the surveillant gaze back on the dominant culture.

Music excerpted in this episode:

'Watching Them Watch Us: A Song About Sousveillance' by thefakesaltychips

'Hello NSA (A Love Song of Mass Surveillance)' by Peter Chiykowski

'Don't Touch My Junk (the TSA Hustle)' by Michael Adams