Who built
the digital economy, and whose labor has been overlooked in the stories we tell
about its development? The Inattention Economy challenges familiar
narratives of technological innovation by tracing the often uncredited and
unpaid contributions of women of color across three pivotal moments in
computing: the microchip era of the 1960s and ’70s, the rise of social media in
the 2000s, and the emergence of AI-fueled virtual reality in the 2020s. Through
the stories of Navajo women who manufactured early semiconductor circuits,
Vietnamese American internet pioneer Tila Tequila, and Black virtual reality
creators, the book examines how gendered and racialized labor has shaped the
technologies and platforms embedded in everyday life. In doing so, it offers a
counterhistory of Silicon Valley that calls for both recognition and material
compensation for the labor that has made the digital economy possible. 

The DSI Reading Room is a conversation series featuring new books by Digital
Studies Institute faculty and guest authors. Through public discussions, we
explore emerging scholarship and the ideas shaping technology, culture, media,
and society.

Lisa Nakamura is the Gwendolyn Calvert Baker Collegiate Professor in the
Department of American Culture at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She is
the lead Principal Investigator of the DISCO (Digital Inquiry, Speculation,
Collaboration, and Optimism) Network. Nakamura is also the founding Director of
the Digital Studies Institute at the University of Michigan and has been
writing about digital media, race, and gender since 1994. She has written books
and articles on digital bodies, race, and gender in online environments, on
toxicity in video game culture, and the many reasons that Internet research
needs ethnic and gender studies. She is the author of The Inattention
Economy: How Women of Color Built the Internet (University of Minnesota
Press, 2026), Digitizing Race: Visual Cultures of the Internet
(University of Minnesota Press, 2007), and Cybertypes: Race, Ethnicity, and
Identity on the Internet (Routledge, 2002).





We strive to make our events accessible to all participants. This event will be
a hybrid event with both a physical meeting space and an online meeting space.

CART will be provided. If you anticipate needing accommodations to participate,
please email Eric Mancini at [email protected]. Please note that
some accommodations must be arranged in advance, and we encourage you to
contact us as soon as possible.