Guest Lecture: A Transnational Approach to Researching Dating Cultures
What can dating apps teach us about the global circulation of intimacy, identity, and design?
Join Dr. Łukasz Szulc (University of Manchester) for “A Transnational Approach to Researching Dating Cultures” — a talk that rethinks how we study digital intimacy across borders.
Drawing on transnational cultural studies, Dr. Szulc traces how platforms like Tinder, Bumble, and Grindr shape — and are shaped by — global flows of people, technologies, and desires.
Thursday, Nov 13 | 12:30–2PM
Online for UofT students, staff, and faculty
Click here to RSVP
*Advanced registration required; reserved for those with a UofT email address
About the Talk
Over 350 million people worldwide use dating apps, with more than 1,500 dating websites and apps operating globally. In this competitive market, companies strive to stand out by developing innovative features. Yet, such innovation can mask core similarities − most notably, that leading platforms (including Tinder, Bumble, and Grindr) are designed by for-profit companies headquartered in the US, despite their global reach. This underscores the need for a cross-border perspective, alongside a historical approach, to account for the transformation of dating cultures in the context of their intensified mediation, commodification, and globalisation. In this talk, I propose a transnational approach that emphasizes rapid technological change, large-scale migration, and increased cross-cultural exchange. I introduce a new framework for transnational cultural studies of dating, detailing its ontological and epistemological foundations, guiding principles, methods, and research agenda.
About the Speaker
Dr. Łukasz Szulc is a Senior Lecturer in Digital Media and Culture at the University of Manchester. His research focuses on critical and cultural studies of digital media, particularly at the intersections of gender, sexuality, and transnationalism. He co-edited the 2024 Special Issue of the journal Communication, Culture and Critique on “Transnational Queer Cultures and Digital Media” (with Yener Bayramoğlu and Radhika Gajjala) and is the author of the book Transnational Homosexuals in Communist Poland: Cross-Border Flows in Gay and Lesbian Magazines (2018).