"That's an old one...hard to learn."
"Yes, but once you've mastered it, you're free. We've grown reliant on tech and we've made ourselves vulnerable. There's a growing list of things we've known and forgotten."
The image and quotes above are from the Star Wars miniseries Andor. Preparing for an operation against the Empire, Andor is speaking with another character, Nemik, who fiddles with a piece of complicated-looking navigational technology -- something like an astrolabe for space travel. This particular device is outdated, having been replaced by more sophisticated, automated versions. The model Nemik holds in his hand requires a lot of manual operation, and a lot of know-how. Andor seems to be implying is that there are easier ways to achieve Nemik's purpose. He almost seems to be asking, "Why bother?"
But Nemik isn't having it. For him, Imperial authority depends on its ability to make us forget how to live in the world. The connections to our own world are obvious. The show's writers understand Authoritarianism as a governing strategy whose success depends in part on its ability to make citizens forget their histories, and to forget how to function independent of authoritarians' rule. Not unlike the characters in the Star Wars universe, we in the real world have come to rely on all manner of technology that asserts itself as more convenient, even necessary for our safety. All the while, it leads us to forget how to navigate our world independent of this technological structure.
Though it seems bizarre to admit, pushing back against this trend feels like an increasingly radical position.
Here, you can find materials used for the Digital Geographies Club. While the club no longer exists, what I learned from running it has informed upcoming classes I will teach starting on Spring 2026 on digital technologies of liberation.
Cheat Sheet
Lesson 1
Lesson 2
Lesson 3
Lesson 4