Nick Seaver

Anthropologist, Tufts University



I study how people use technology to make sense of cultural things. I teach in the Department of Anthropology at Tufts University, where I also direct the program in Science, Technology, and Society.


My first book is about the people who make music recommender systems and how they think about music, listening, and listeners. It’s called Computing Taste, and it was published by the University of Chicago Press in 2022.
         I’m working on a new book about the many meanings of attention today, from neural networks to the new tech humanism. Its working title is Attention Fragments, and it’s under contract with the University of Chicago Press.
        I’ve got a handful of pieces making their way through the publication pipeline on various topics: ideologies of attention in ethnographic fieldwork, the media theory of mouse jigglers, and how people use clues to identify AI-generated writing.
        For the 2025 meetings of the American Anthropological Association, I’m organizing a panel on the anthropology of contraptions.
        In the 2024–25 academic year, I’m on sabbatical and a fellow with the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard. I am also currently a Canadian Institute for Advanced Research fellow, in their Future Flourishing Program.     
July 2025