Media Hot and Cold

Nicole Starosielski's book "Media Hot and Cold" explores the cultural dimensions of temperature, discussing how heat and cold can be used as a means of communication, subjugation, and control. It explores the history of thermal media, from infrared cameras to thermostats, and how digital thermal media such as bodily air conditioners offer personalized forms of thermal communication and comfort. However, it also shows how these new media can operate as a form of biopower by determining who has the ability to control their own thermal environment, potentially enacting thermal violence that reinforces racialized, colonial, gendered, and sexualized hierarchies.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 296 pages
Publication date: 11 January 2022
Publisher: Duke University Press

Nicole Starosielski delves into the multifaceted cultural aspects of temperature, exploring its potential as a tool for communication, subjugation, and control. Tracing the historical evolution of thermal media, from infrared cameras to thermostats to torture sweatboxes, Starosielski uncovers the rich meanings and messages associated with temperature. In the twentieth century, heat and cold were widely disseminated through mass thermal media, while today, digital thermal media, such as personal air conditioners, offer personalized forms of thermal comfort. While these new media hold the promise of mitigating climate change's uneven impacts, Starosielski cautions that they can also operate as a form of biopower, determining who has control over their thermal environment. This control can perpetuate racialized, colonial, gendered, and sexualized hierarchies, resulting in thermal violence that reinforces these systems. By highlighting the relationship between temperature control and power relations, Starosielski provides a valuable framework for understanding the dramatic transformations of hot and cold media in the twenty-first century.

Weight: 436g
Dimension: 153 x 229 x 28 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781478014546