AI Narratives and the French Touch

Abstract

Late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century French culture explores the birth of the technologies which underpin our contemporary life, from audio-visual recording to industrial automation. This chapter proposes that there is a uniquely French mode of approaching what we would now recognize as artificial intelligence (AI): a mode that is distinct from the fragmentation of Anglo–American modernism or the fascist sex-and-speed machines of Italian futurism. The French touch lies in its meta-reflexive narrative play, which allows it to test out technological and political scenarios. This chapter teases out its specificity by turning to two critically overlooked late nineteenth-century narratives and suggests that looking back to these imaginings of the past can help us to navigate our technological present.