Stephen Yang is a PhD candidate at USC Annenberg, where he studies the conditions and possibilities of collective life at the interstices of media, technology, and environment. His research traces the techniques through which the environment is rendered perceptible or made self-evident, with an eye toward how such techniques organize the present we inhabit and the future horizons we are oriented toward.

Specifically, Yang’s dissertation examines the historical formations and contemporary ramifications of “smart” buildings. As building operations become increasingly automated, predictive, and energy-responsive, he traces how such technical configurations take shape within changing divisions of labor, market dynamics, and normative orientations. Against this backdrop, he asks what is at stakes when the pursuit of human comfort—via environmental conditioning—is fastened with heterogeneous concerns, and what these tensions portend for “building” sustainable futures onward.

Across his projects, Yang pursues his research through critical, interpretive, and speculative modes of inquiry. His work weaves together theories and approaches across communication, media studies, science and technology studies (STS), and geography.

Yang’s research is supported by the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship (NSF GRFP) and the Center on Science, Technology, and Public Life (STPL) at USC. Beyond academia, he has also held appointments at Microsoft Research, Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT), and Partnership on AI. Prior to USC, he earned his B.S. in Communication and Information Science from Cornell University.

Read more about Yang here: www.stephen-yang.com