What Is at Stake? The Co-Encoding/Decoding Model of Human–Generative Artificial Intelligence Communication

Abstract

This article introduces the co-encoding/decoding (co-en/de) model to theorize the stakes of human–Generative AI (GenAI) communication. Extending Stuart Hall’s encoding/decoding framework, the model conceptualizes human–GenAI interactions as recursive circuits of meaning-making. Through a typology of co-encoding and decoding modes, this article identifies how these interactions feed back into three core conditions of subjectivity—knowledge, agency, and power infrastructures—ultimately shaping the relational ontology of human actors and GenAI systems. We argue that 2 emergent hybrid subjectivities are formed on a fluid spectrum, from the Android, a diminished human subject shaped by machinic hegemony, to the Cyborg, an augmented subjectivity that fosters resistance and democratic agency. By moving beyond techno-determinist and institutionalist accounts, this study offers a relational, critical framework for understanding how GenAI systems mediate discourse and subject formation. It concludes by outlining the conditions under which counter-hegemonic human–GenAI interactions may emerge.