Abdullah Safir
R e i m a g i n i n g A I f r o m t h e m a r g i n
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Email: sa2168@cam.ac.uk
Abdullah Safir is a Cambridge-based AI ethics researcher interested in reimagining Artificial Intelligence (AI) particularly from the Majority World/ Global South perspectives. He applies critical, decolonial and design-centric approaches to understand AI, codes, and data infrastructures and uses digital, ethnographic, and humanities-based methods to analyse the implications of these digital artifacts on the historically marginalised populations in such regions. His works have been featured (or forthcoming) in peer-reviewed journals, including Big Data and Society (Accepted for a Special Issue), Information, Communication and Society (Accepted for a Special Issue), and Cambridge Journal for Science and Policy, and at the same time in top social computing venues, such as CHI, CSCW, ICT4D and ACM Interactions, as well as in an edited collection on 'Putting Data Justice in Context' (Accepted, Publisher TBD). He was a scientific and organising committee member of the Many Worlds of AI conference, curator of the panel on AI from the Margin, and co-editor of the resulting digital proceedings of the event. He also co-designed a toolkit for the journalists worldwide to help them responsibly communicate AI's harms and potentials.
Safir is currently studying MPhil in Ethics of AI, Data and Algorithms at the Leverhulme Centre for Future of Intelligence (LCFI) at the University of Cambridge with a Trinity Hall Postgraduate Research Studentship. He was a former Research Assistant at the same Centre. Previously, Safir completed his Master’s in Digital Media and Culture at the Centre for Interdisciplinary Methodologies (CIM) at the University of Warwick with Commonwealth Scholarship, achieved distinctions, and was awarded for his overall academic excellence. He holds a Bachelor degree in Engineering from Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET). Before coming to the UK, Safir co-developed a Digital Strategy Primer for Bangladesh as a former Senior Research Associate at BIGD, BRAC University in collaboration with Digital Pathways at Oxford which was launched by the State Minister of the ICT Division of the country.
Recent news/ updates
November 2023: Was Invited to McMenemy Seminar at Trinity Hall to present research on 'AI in/from from the Margin'
November 2023: Was Interviewed for Jamuna Television on AI and Responsible Journalism in the Global South [Link]
November 2023: Appeared as a guest lecturer at University of Liberal Arts Bangladesh [Link]
October 2023: AI & Responsible Journalism Toolkit Published [Link]
October 2023: Co-organised workshop at CSCW: Many Worlds of Ethics [Link]
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