S. Craig Watkins

Executive Director, IC2 Institute | Ernest A. Sharpe Centennial Professor, Moody College of Communication, UT

S. Craig Watkins is the Ernest A. Sharpe Centennial Professor and the Executive Director of the IC² Institute at the University of Texas at Austin. Craig is one of the Principal Investigators for UT-Austin’s Good Systems Grand Challenge, a university-funded initiative that supports multi-disciplinary explorations of the technical, social, and ethical implications of artificial intelligence. As Executive Director of the IC² Institute, Craig directs quantitative and qualitative research that explores the intersection between AI and health, with a particular focus on underserved populations and safety net providers.

Craig is an internationally recognized expert in media and technology systems and the author of six books. His research explores, among other things, how technological innovation built the hip-hop economy (Hip Hop Matters), the social and behavioral implications of young people’s engagement with computer-mediated technologies (The Young and the Digital), the shifting contours of the digital divide (The Digital Edge), and the creative ways young people adopt technology to navigate a precarious society and economy (Don’t Knock the Hustle). This work illuminates the nuanced ways in which structural inequalities influence the design, deployment, and adoption of computer-mediated systems leading to both systemic challenges and opportunities to enhance the human experience

Watkins’ work has been profiled in places as varied as the Washington Post, The Atlantic, Newsweek, TIME, ESPN, and NPR, and featured at venues like SXSW, The Aspen Institute, The Boston Federal Reserve, New York Hall of Science, MIT’s Media Lab, and The New York Times Dialogue on Race. Craig was a Visiting MLK Professor at MIT, where he continues to collaborate with faculty in the Institute for Data, Systems and Society (IDSS) to study the racial equity implications of artificial intelligence.