---> workshop description <---

This workshop is an exploration of large language models (LLMs)—entities that challenge our understanding of language, authorship, and what it means to relate to AI, to ourselves, and to each other. These systems, trained on vast patterns of human expression, reflect us while operating in ways fundamentally unlike us. Computationally alien in their operations, synthetic in their construction, and non-human in their intelligence, they invite us to confront the limits of what we consider human.

---> Over four weeks, we’ll explore:

• The mechanics of LLMs: How they are trained, how they operate, and how they reflect and reshape human language.

• The alien and the familiar: What does it mean to encounter an entity made entirely of human expression, yet built on principles radically different from human thought?

• Relationality as a transformative act: How do LLMs alter the ways we connect—with each other, with ideas, and with non-human entities?

• Radical frameworks for connection: Drawing on Indigenous and non-Western perspectives, we’ll explore alternative ways of relating to AI that challenge dominant paradigms of control and utility.