Keynotes

Biography

Roopika Risam is a scholar of digital humanities and critical data studies whose work examines how data, archives, and technologies shape histories of race, colonialism, and power. She is Professor of Film and Media Studies and Comparative Literature at Dartmouth College and the author of New Digital Worlds: Postcolonial Digital Humanities in Theory, Praxis, and Pedagogy. Her research and public projects, including the Pan-African Data Project and Reanimate, explore how digital methods can surface marginalized histories while challenging the epistemic limits of dominant archives. Her forthcoming book, Data Empire (Harper, 2026), traces the global history of data as a tool of governance from ancient recordkeeping to contemporary algorithmic systems. Learn more at https://roopikarisam.com

Biography

Francesca Sobande is a writer and reader in digital media studies at Cardiff University (Wales/Cymru). Her books include The Digital Lives of Black Women in Britain (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020), Consuming Crisis (SAGE, 2022), and Big Brands Are Watching You (University of California Press, 2024). Francesca is also co-author of Look, Don't Touch: Reflections on the Freedom to Feel (404 Ink, 2025) and Black Oot Here: Black Lives in Scotland (Bloomsbury, 2022), as well as the free self-published graphic novel, Black Oot Here: Dreams O Us (2023). Her most recent writing includes the free self-published zine, Black Life in / and "Alt" Music Subcultures (2025), in addition to essays on "Echoes: Soft Space and Solidarity in the Legacy of Hardcore Punk" (Folding Rock),"She Burns: The Heat of Black Women in Blues and Punk" (Shuddhashar) and "The Inhale and Exhale of Art" (Shuddhashar). Francesca is currently working on a self-published comic, Balsamic Night, and an illustrated poetry collection, Haar.