Humans in the Loop: AI, Labour, and the Politics of Representation

I am writing this blog as part of a thinking activity assigned by Dr. Dilip Barad after the screening of Humans in the Loop. For this task, he provided a detailed worksheet that guided us through pre-viewing preparation, key points to observe during the film, and post-viewing critical reflection. This blog is my response to that structured task, where I attempt to analyze the film using concepts from film studies and cultural theory, especially focusing on AI, labour, representation, and knowledge systems.

Introduction

In the contemporary digital age, Artificial Intelligence is often presented as neutral, intelligent, and independent. However, Humans in the Loop, directed by Aranya Sahay, challenges this dominant narrative by foregrounding the human labour and cultural knowledge that sustain AI systems. The film follows Nehma, an Adivasi woman from Jharkhand, whose entry into AI data-labelling work reveals the hidden connections between technology, identity, and power.Rather than portraying AI as futuristic spectacle, the film situates it within lived realities,family life, ecological knowledge, and marginalized labour. It raises important questions: Who trains machines? Whose knowledge is recognized in digital systems? And what happens when indigenous epistemologies encounter rigid algorithmic categories?This blog critically engages with the film through a structured worksheet provided as part of an academic task. By applying concepts from film studies, such as representation, ideology, mise-en-scène, and labour theory,the analysis aims to explore how the film connects digital culture with issues of bias, visibility, and socio-political inequality.

Pre-Viewing Reflection: Technology, Power, and the World Nehma Inhabits

Before analyzing the cinematic language of Humans in the Loop,

it is essential to understand the socio-technical environment that shapes the protagonist’s reality. The film does not exist in isolation; it emerges from a world structured by global capitalism, digital economies, and unequal knowledge systems. Nehma’s entry into AI data work is not just a personal journey—it is a window into how technology reorganizes labour, visibility, and power.Director Aranya Sahay places the narrative within the broader logic of techno-capitalism, where innovation is celebrated, but the workers sustaining it remain unseen. This pre-viewing reflection, therefore, focuses on three interconnected concerns: the concealed human infrastructure of AI, digital alienation, and the ideological construction of machine intelligence.

 1. The Unseen Human Network Behind Artificial Intelligence

Artificial Intelligence is often marketed as self-learning and autonomous. Popular discourse suggests that algorithms independently analyze data and make decisions. However, machine learning systems depend on vast amounts of manually labelled data. Behind every automated prediction lies repetitive human input.Workers in economically marginalized regions perform tasks such as tagging images, identifying objects, or correcting outputs. This labour is rarely acknowledged in mainstream technological narratives. The geographic distance between global tech corporations and rural workers creates a hierarchy of visibility and value.By situating its story in Jharkhand rather than in corporate technology hubs, the film redirects attention to this hidden infrastructure. It disrupts the illusion that AI is purely computational. Instead, it suggests that technology is deeply human—constructed, trained, and maintained by people whose names rarely appear in discussions of innovation.Thus, before watching the film, one must recognize that AI is not immaterial intelligence; it is structured by global labour relations.

 2. Cognitive Labour and Digital Dispossession

From a Marxist perspective, digital labour represents a new stage of capitalist extraction. Traditionally, workers sold physical strength in factories. In contemporary digital economies, workers sell perception, attention, and cognitive effort.Nehma’s role as a data labeller illustrates this shift. She contributes her ability to recognize patterns, interpret images, and apply contextual understanding. Yet she has no ownership over the system she helps refine. The algorithms remain corporate property, and the economic profits circulate elsewhere.This condition reflects alienation in a modern form. The worker becomes separated not only from the product but also from the meaning of her labour. The work is repetitive and abstract, disconnected from immediate community benefit. Human intelligence is reduced to micro-tasks.In this way, the film invites viewers to question whether technological progress simultaneously deepens economic inequality. It suggests that in digital capitalism, even knowledge and perception become commodities.

 3. The Manufactured Myth of the Independent Machine

One of the central ideological strategies of the tech industry is the construction of the “autonomous machine.” AI is framed as objective, efficient, and free from human flaws. This narrative increases public trust and market value.However, this autonomy is partly an illusion. The system depends on constant human supervision and correction. If this human presence were made fully visible, the magic of automation would dissolve. Consumers might begin to question the ethical and economic structures supporting these technologies.By foregrounding Nehma’s labour, the film dismantles this myth. It reveals that AI systems are not detached from society but embedded within social hierarchies. The “human in the loop” is not merely a technical necessity—it is evidence of dependency.This reframing transforms AI from a symbol of futuristic advancement into a site of political and ethical debate. The film compels the viewer to confront the reality that behind every smart system lies a network of human lives.

Points to Ponder While Watching

A Close Viewing Guide for Humans in the Loop

While watching the film directed by Aranya Sahay, it is important not to view it only as a story about AI. The film functions on multiple layers—narrative, cultural, visual, and political. The following points help in developing a deeper cinematic and theoretical understanding.

1️⃣ Narrative & Storytelling

🔹 Personal Life Within Algorithmic Systems

The film carefully interweaves Nehma’s domestic world with global technological structures. Her everyday activities—family conversations, rituals, and interactions with nature—are placed alongside repetitive digital labour. This parallel structure shows how global AI systems penetrate intimate spaces.

Notice how narrative shifts occur when labour enters her personal life. Moments that foreground:

• Economic pressure within the family

• Emotional exhaustion from repetitive tasks

• Conflicts between cultural values and algorithmic demands

These narrative turns highlight that AI is not distant or abstract. It directly shapes lived experiences. The storytelling suggests that technological systems are not separate from society; they reorganize it.

🔹 Teaching the Machine: Beyond Technical Language

When Nehma “teaches” AI through data labelling, the film transforms a technical process into a philosophical metaphor. Machine learning appears dependent rather than autonomous.

The “human-machine loop” becomes symbolic:

• The machine depends on human perception.

• The human adapts her understanding to fit machine categories.

• A cycle of negotiation emerges between lived knowledge and programmed structure.

This interaction raises a crucial question: Who is actually learning—the machine or the human adjusting herself to the system?

2️⃣ Representation & Cultural Context

🔹 Depiction of Adivasi Identity

Observe how the film represents Adivasi culture:

• Use of native language in dialogue

• Representation of rituals without exotic framing

• Natural landscapes shown as lived environments, not tourist imagery

The camera does not treat cultural practices as spectacle. Instead, it presents them as part of everyday reality. This grounded representation grants dignity and agency to the community.

🔹 Challenging Dominant Stereotypes

Mainstream media often portrays tribal communities as either primitive or completely detached from technology. The film disrupts this binary.

By placing Nehma at the center of AI production, it suggests:

• Technology is not limited to urban elites.

• Indigenous individuals are active participants in global digital economies.

• Tradition and modernity coexist rather than oppose each other.

Thus, representation becomes a site of resistance against stereotypical narratives.

3️⃣ Cinematic Style & Meaning

Film meaning is not created only through dialogue; it is shaped through visual and auditory language.

🔹 Mise-en-Scène & Cinematography

Pay attention to spatial contrasts:

• Forest scenes: Often framed in wide shots with natural lighting, emphasizing openness and continuity.

• Computer workspace: Tighter frames, cooler tones, and rigid compositions that suggest confinement.

• Ritual scenes: Layered compositions that foreground community and collective presence.

This contrast visually symbolizes two knowledge systems—organic, relational life versus structured, coded digital space.

The placement of screens within frames also matters. Often, Nehma is shown facing the screen, emphasizing the dominance of the technological interface. The framing may create a sense of enclosure, reflecting psychological and economic restriction.

🔹 Sound Design & Editing

Sound plays a crucial role in reinforcing thematic contrast:

• Ambient sounds of wind, birds, and community life create a sensory, immersive atmosphere.

• Digital sounds—mouse clicks, keyboard typing, notification alerts—interrupt natural rhythms.

Editing patterns may alternate between slow-paced rural life and repetitive, almost mechanical sequences of labelling work. This rhythmic shift reinforces the emotional toll of digital labour.

The juxtaposition of these sonic and visual elements creates tension between analog life and digital abstraction.

4️⃣ Ethical & Political Questions

🔹 Ethical Dilemmas in Training AI

When AI systems require culturally specific data, ethical problems arise:

• Can sacred spaces be reduced to neutral categories?

• Does standardization erase spiritual or contextual meanings?

• Who decides the “correct” label for culturally complex realities?

These dilemmas expose the limits of algorithmic thinking.

🔹 The Metaphor of “Human-in-the-Loop”

Technically, the term refers to human supervision within machine learning systems. However, in the film, it carries deeper significance.

• Politically: It reveals how marginalized communities sustain global industries.

• Socially: It reflects dependency of machines on human cognition.

• Culturally: It emphasizes that knowledge cannot be fully automated.

The metaphor suggests that despite narratives of automation, the human remains central—though often invisible.While watching Humans in the Loop, it is essential to observe not just what is shown, but how it is shown. The film uses narrative structure, representation, visual contrast, and sound design to question the neutrality of AI.It invites viewers to reconsider technology not as an isolated innovation but as a cultural system shaped by power, labour, and knowledge hierarchies.

Post-Viewing Reflective Essay

Knowledge, Power, and the Cultural Politics of AI

A Critical Reading of Humans in the Loop

Directed by Aranya Sahay, Humans in the Loop is not merely a film about artificial intelligence or digital labour. It is a layered and intellectually rich exploration of how knowledge is organized, validated, and controlled within technological systems. The film questions the dominant narrative that AI is objective, neutral, and purely technical. Instead, it reveals AI as socially produced, culturally embedded, and ideologically structured.This essay examines how the film represents algorithmic bias and epistemic hierarchy, using concepts from film theory and cultural critique to unpack the political implications of its narrative and cinematic form.

I. Algorithmic Bias as Cultural Construction

Artificial Intelligence is often described in popular discourse as mathematical and therefore impartial. The assumption is that algorithms operate through logic rather than prejudice. However, Humans in the Loop dismantles this assumption by demonstrating that algorithms do not exist independently of human influence. They are created, trained, and refined within specific socio-cultural environments.Through Nehma’s repetitive data-labelling work, the film exposes how machine learning systems depend on predefined categories. Images must be reduced to simplified labels—“forest,” “road,” “vehicle,” or “obstacle.” These categories appear neutral, yet they are rooted in particular cultural frameworks that prioritize functional, extractive, or utilitarian understandings of the world.When Nehma encounters images that hold spiritual or communal meaning within her Adivasi worldview, her hesitation becomes narratively significant. The algorithm does not possess the conceptual vocabulary to recognize sacredness, relational identity, or ancestral connection. It can only process what it has been programmed to acknowledge.

In this way, bias emerges not as a technical malfunction but as epistemological limitation. The machine reflects the worldview of its designers and the datasets it has been fed. The film subtly suggests that what AI “fails” to recognize is not an error in code, but a consequence of whose knowledge has been prioritized during its construction. Algorithmic bias, therefore, is culturally situated.

II. Epistemic Hierarchies: The Politics of Knowing

At the heart of the film lies a conflict between two knowledge systems: computational rationality and indigenous ecological understanding. Nehma embodies lived, experiential knowledge rooted in land, memory, and community. However, within the digital workspace, she is not treated as a knowledge bearer. She is positioned as a functionary whose role is to feed data into a larger system.This dynamic reflects what scholars describe as epistemic hierarchy—the ranking of knowledge systems according to perceived legitimacy. Scientific and technological knowledge is often framed as universal and superior, while indigenous or oral traditions are marginalized as subjective or localized.

The film visualizes this hierarchy through spatial and visual contrast. Scenes set in the forest are expansive, fluid, and immersive. Natural light and wide frames evoke openness and interconnectedness. In contrast, the digital interface is presented through tight framing, boxed grids, and rigid composition. The screen divides reality into segments, symbolizing the compartmentalization of knowledge.By juxtaposing these visual worlds, the film critiques the assumption that technological classification equals progress. It raises an important question: If innovation demands the erasure of alternative epistemologies, can it still be considered advancement? The emotional conflict experienced by Nehma underscores the human cost of epistemic marginalization.

III. Apparatus Theory and Ideological Mediation

Apparatus Theory offers a powerful lens through which to analyze the film’s representation of technology. According to this theory, cinema is not a neutral medium; it shapes spectators’ perception through framing, perspective, and narrative control. The cinematic apparatus positions viewers in particular ideological relationships to what they see.In Humans in the Loop, this idea is mirrored within the narrative itself. The audience observes Nehma interacting with the computer screen. This creates a layered structure of spectatorship: we watch a character who is herself positioned before another apparatus—the algorithmic interface.

Both cinema and AI function as systems of mediation. They frame reality, select what is visible, and organize meaning. By foregrounding the screen within the frame, the film makes spectators aware of this process. It invites viewers to question how technological systems categorize and interpret the world.The AI interface becomes symbolic of broader power relations. It represents the authority of global technological systems that determine what knowledge is valid and what remains invisible. Through its careful framing and narrative structure, the film exposes how representation itself is shaped by ideology.

Thus, technology in the film is not depicted as detached machinery. It is portrayed as an extension of social structures that privilege certain forms of knowledge over others.

IV. Digital Modernity and the Risk of Cultural Erasure

Another significant dimension of the film is its exploration of cultural erasure in the age of digital modernity. Standardized datasets require uniform categories. However, uniformity often comes at the expense of diversity.Nehma’s world is relational and spiritually grounded. It values interconnectedness between humans, land, and ancestors. The algorithmic world, by contrast, operates through extraction and classification. It transforms complex realities into usable data points.

The act of labelling, therefore, becomes symbolic. Each click of the mouse represents negotiation—between economic necessity and cultural integrity, between survival and selfhood. Nehma’s labour is not simply technical; it is existential. She must decide how to translate her world into a language that the machine can understand, even when that language feels inadequate.This dynamic echoes broader concerns about digital coloniality. Historically, colonial systems imposed linguistic and epistemic dominance upon marginalized communities. In a contemporary context, algorithmic systems risk imposing standardized frameworks that flatten cultural specificity.

The film does not present Nehma as anti-technology. Rather, it portrays her struggle against reduction. Her hesitation reveals the violence embedded in forcing rich cultural realities into rigid computational structures.

Conclusion: Reclaiming the “Human” in the Loop

Ultimately, Humans in the Loop argues that AI cannot be separated from the human values, labour, and cultural contexts that sustain it. The phrase “human in the loop” is more than technical terminology. It signals dependency. Machines require human cognition, perception, and judgment.By centering an Adivasi woman within a narrative about artificial intelligence, the film disrupts dominant representations of technology as urban, elite, and detached from marginalized communities. It foregrounds the reality that global technological systems rely on invisible human labour shaped by unequal power relations.Through its narrative structure, visual contrasts, and ideological framing, the film encourages viewers to rethink technology as a contested cultural space rather than an inevitable future. It reminds us that AI systems reflect the knowledge hierarchies embedded within society.The future of artificial intelligence, therefore, will not be determined solely by code. It will depend on whose knowledge is recognized, whose realities are encoded, and whose voices are allowed to shape the technological imagination.