Mythemes and mythopoesis for transformers and transformation

GenAI’s opaque mathematical architectures, masked by minimalist “chat” interfaces, have reanimated a nascent sense of mythic and magical experiences among workers in the US. Through analyses of workshops focused on cultural transformation and GenAI usage, I demonstrate how now is a moment in which myths are once again “good to think with,” functioning as familiar ordering devices for prompting, designing, leading, and governing AI under uncertainty. I argue that ultimately generative AI participates in a broader recursive symbolic ecology, in which prompting is more than technical instruction; it is a recursive cultural practice through which myth continues to think through both humans and machines.