The Turbulent Sky of Media Ecology

Honorable Mention

Will we use the machine, or let the machine use us? Inspired by Van Gogh’s Post-Impressionism (House, 1980), my pencil drawing illustrates my research into the ecological impact of AI in education. Rather than viewing AI as "just a tool," I position it as an entirely new environment that reshapes human consciousness (Rose, 2012). The swirling sky represents the "Third Space" (Blakely & Hemphill, 2021) a digital-physical hybrid where ME "Rückenfigur" element (Bara & Cross, 2025) acts as a mediator between the traditional schoolhouse and the encroaching "Technopoly" of the city skyline. As a researcher, I am questioning what technology "giveth" and what it "taketh away" (Postman, 1993, p. 5). The floating books and the watchful "eye" in the sky represent Agential Realism (Blakely & Hemphill, 2021, p. 43): the idea that technology is not a passive object, but an active agent with its own bias that forces us to use our minds in specific ways (McGuire, 2025). This image captures the moment a leader stops being used by technology and starts using it with critical, questioning intent (Postman, 1993, p. 105).