STS/ANT Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

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- Digital Media, Social Media, Affordances, STS/ANT

In memory of Bruno Latour who responded quickly to this paper upon its publication////
This is an experimental essay to reconsider the meaning of animism in the time of science and technology studies when the boundary between human and non-human entities is being redrawn. Referring to various sources from my earlier research on Javanese animism and peasant movements such as Saminism to the recent social studies of life sciences that are related to such issues as artificial life and so forth, this article tries to redefine what is animism in the contemporary techno-cultural landscape. This is related to the exhibition of Animism curated by Anselm Franke.

Who acts in during international relations? From state theory generally, and the field of International Relations specifically, the readymade answer is: ‘states do’ – so long as we assume states to be the high-modern regime of nation-states that so dominantly sorted-out conceptual possibilities of political agency during the 20th century. An alternative approach to global politics, in contrast, searches for political power beyond the state. Contemporary shifts toward neo-liberal and other transnational regimes are reshaping the political landscape to enable entities beyond the state to gain importance in governance. We are, thus, left with two options: We see states as entities capable of acting on the stage of global politics, or we see states as one of many patterns through which political activity is enacted. This dichotomy neatly parallels how agency has been conceptualized in social theory: Either we swallow the bitter pill of essentializing a high-modern model of human nature to understand how actors establish, maintain, and transform political order, or we join the deconstruction camp and dissect the mechanisms, techniques, and discursive patterns that surround this model of human nature, which will then one day probably be ‘erased, like a face drawn in the sand at the edge of the sea.’ We develop this tension in our paper about who or what acts during international relations.

- by Nicholas J Rowland
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- Social Theory, International Relations, Political Theory, Actor Network Theory

With the Reform of school autonomy in the nineties, and later with the most recent education legislations, it was attempted to trigger processes of change with regard to mathematics and its teaching but these changes have proved difficult to implement. Through the perspective of the Actor-Network Theory in education and Science and Technology Studies , this paper aims to analyze the role that the materiality covers in the construction of teaching strategies of this discipline. Starting from an multi-sited ethnography study held in five high schools in Rome, the use of some common classroom artifacts, such as blackboards and textbooks, will be specifically considered to show how their use/non-use can facilitate the activation of different forms of mathematical knowledge. The paper concludes with some reflections resulting from research on innovation in mathematics education.

- by Alessia Pozzi
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- Mathematics, Sociology of Education, Mathematics Education, Education Policy

What happened, in the years leading up to Valentine's Day 2014, that made a canister of nuclear waste burst open and spew out fire underground at a US facility for the long-term disposal of radioactive military waste? According to one widely publicized scenario, a simple run-of-the-mill typo led to organic kitty litter mistakenly being used to soak up liquid in the drum instead of another kind of absorbent material. This ultimately led to a reaction that made heat and pressure build up in the drum, causing it to erupt. But was that "simple" clerical error symptomatic of a much deeper, system-wide problem-- involving a US Energy Department plan to rush the pace of nuclear waste disposal? What were the political, social, and financial elements involved in making Los Alamos' waste drum #68660 erupt that February night? What can be done to prevent similar accidents – which can have price tags of hundreds of millions of dollars or more – from happening again in the future? A cultural anthropologist spent 10 weeks onsite after the event, logging 43 interviews and trying to answer these questions. Here is what he found.

English abstract A new social actor has recently established itself in the food market, following values that are becoming more and more relevant today, such as simplicity, nature and tradition. It is the raw milk dispenser. This paper highlights its social function, starting from the assumption of a symmetric approach, as pointed out by Bruno Latour, whereby human and non-human actors are given the same importance, being equally involved in the practices by which the social world is defined. In particular, the paper is based on a sociological study concerning the emergence of technological objects in Italy, as in the perspective of Science and Technology Studies. Much attention is given to the agency of objects, as well as to some unexpected effects, and to the aspects of symbolic mediation involved. English keywords sociology, raw milk, dispenser, delegation, objects.

- by tiziana piccioni
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- Sociology, STS/ANT

By offering a new definition of ‘the Anthropos’ as a distributed-centered subject, or as a collective made of a multiplicity of actors belonging to different ontologies and forming attachments through a series of interrelated translations and what I call ‘an exchange of properties’, this essay not only forces us to rethink our basic ideas of human form, but also lays out a program of research that will be of interest to scholars in Science and Technology Studies as well as to others working in the human, social, political or natural sciences.

- by Hélène Mialet
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- Translation Studies, Social and Cultural Anthropology, The Body, Translation
- by 俊頤(Chun-Yi) 何(Ho)
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- Anthropology, Political Ecology, Infrastructure studies, CBNRM
- by Priscilla Normando and +1
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- Sociology, Philosophy, Technology, Energy

The term "cable," as used in the context of diplomacy, is ambiguous. It denotes both a message and its technological messenger. Telegraph wires were used around the middle of the nineteenth century to connect the capitals of Europe. The network soon expanded, and by 1870, with the laying of submarine cables, fast-traveling telegraphic messages could be sent between Britain, Continental Europe, North America, the Middle East, and India. Through these cables, diplomatic posts communicated with their ministries back home. But the term "cable" also came to denote the message that was sent by telegraph. In this chapter I use this ambiguity as an entry point for an exploration of what the new materialist turn can bring to Diplomatic Studies. I will demonstrate how at three particular points in history the cable, as both diplomatic message and technological messenger, made a difference to how things played out. To make sense of this, one needs to be perceptive of the myriad ways in which meaning and materiality intertwine in the making of what we call diplomacy. What is called for is, in other words, a material-semiotic analysis of diplomacy...

Esta dissertação tem por objetivo tecnografar as agências algorítmicas atreladas ao preço dinâmico da Uber a partir das dimensões retórica/narrativa, material/infraestrutural e afetiva/imaginária que o constituem. Mais especificamente, interessa-nos investigar tais agências a partir dos modos como elas produzem e afetam formas de gerir e experienciar o trabalho. Orientados pela noção foucaultiana de "dispositivo", articulamos um olhar disposicional que considera as agências algorítmicas em sua integração a uma rede heterogênea e dinâmica composta por atores variados. Buscamos compreender as relações de poder e campos de saber que permeiam essas agências, considerando tanto o que a Uber declara sobre os algoritmos, quanto as percepções daqueles que têm suas experiências de trabalho atravessada por eles: os motoristas Uber. Através da tecnografia, operacionalizamos esse olhar disposicional explorando inscrições que materializam o preço dinâmico e as agências algorítmicas, ancorando-os em práticas situadas. Nesse movimento, buscamos compreender quando, e em quais circunstâncias, os algoritmos emergem como uma agência decisiva nas práticas e discursos que organizam o trabalho dos motoristas. Esta pesquisa se baseia prioritariamente em contribuições teóricas e metodológicas vinculadas aos Estudos de Plataforma e aos Estudos Críticos de Algoritmos, em especial àquelas que se aproximam dos estudos de comunicação e mídia. A partir deste referencial, propomos uma conceituação sobre algoritmos e poder algorítmico que informa o restante do trabalho. A análise da dimensão retórica/narrativa do preço dinâmico revelou a articulação da promessa de objetividade dos algoritmos a um ideal de mercado autorregulado. A exploração da dimensão material/infraestrutural examinou os esforços de desenvolvimento tecnológico da Uber que subsidiam a operacionalização do preço dinâmico por meio da datificação de territórios e da antecipação de dinâmicas futuras. Já a dimensão afetiva/imaginária enfatiza as percepções e experiências dos motoristas em seus encontros cotidianos com o preço dinâmico, bem como os afetos, estratégias e saberes que emergem nestes encontros. Finalmente, nas considerações finais, alinhavamos essas três frentes de análise à luz do olhar disposicional e fornecemos alguns apontamentos sobre as precariedades e incertezas que marcam o trabalho algorítmico.

- by Abel Guerra
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- Algorithms, Epistemology, Communication, Media Studies
- by Maja de Langen
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- Medical Anthropology, Chronic Pain, Chronic Pain Management and Self-Care, STS/ANT

Comme dans de nombreux domaines technologiques et industriels, l’exploration et l’exploitation minières s’appuient sur des instruments censés prévoir et organiser les développements futurs et leurs conséquences. Dans cet article, nous nous intéressons à trois formes de mobilisation du futur dans le cadre de ces activités et de leurs contestations : 1) l’investissement, caractérisé par le calcul des profits futurs et la place centrale accordée aux risques susceptibles de les remettre en cause ; 2) l’anticipation, qui associe l’activité extractive à des considérations plus larges susceptibles de faire émerger des questionnements nouveaux et une autre définition des risques ; 3) la planification, qui consiste à organiser l’activité minière en fonction d’objectifs à atteindre, tels que le développement territorial, par exemple. En se fondant sur plusieurs terrains (France métropolitaine, Nouvelle-Calédonie, Guyane), cet article propose de montrer qu’une analyse des formes de mobilisation du futur permet de repenser le problème bien connu des relations entre les entreprises minières, l’environnement et les populations concernées.

- by Julien Merlin
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- Sociology, Controversy, Research Related to Metallic and Minerals, STS/ANT

The paper reflects on the extent to which design may be able to expand forms of intervention and inquiry into urban problems by generating spaces for collaboration, involvement and criticism. Following on from the urban hacking case with homeless people in Santiago de Chile, this study proposes an alternative conceptualization of Smart urbanism: instead of understanding the city as a commercial entity that requires more “intelligence”, we show the urban space as a place populated by heterogeneous forms of intelligence and competences that are mobilized by the affected people themselves. This leads us to consider urban design in terms of the temporal and situated practices of its subjects. Finally, and in continuity with various contemporary perspectives on speculative design and the way in which materiality plays a part in the political, this paper examines an analytical repertoire for rethinking the ecology of inhabited spaces through intervention methods that are based on temporary prototypes.

O objetivo desta tese de doutorado é analisar o processo de "plataformização" do jornalismo pelo Facebook, com foco nas disputas e controvérsias em torno das parcerias comerciais, tecnológicas e editoriais estabelecidas entre a plataforma e instituições jornalísticas. Por plataformização entende-se o processo de imbricamento e mútua moldagem entre a lógica das plataformas online e diferentes setores sociais. No caso do jornalismo, o Facebook se oferece como infraestrutura que promete soluções e demanda ajustes nas práticas e lógicas de funcionamento das instituições. Nosso estudo se concentra entre os meses de janeiro de 2014 e julho de 2019. Neste período, identificamos dois momentos principais deste processo de plataformização: o primeiro está centrado na implementação da ferramenta Instant Articles, através da qual, desde 2015, a plataforma procura se estabelecer como infraestrutura para a produção, circulação e monetização do conteúdo jornalístico; o segundo se organiza em torno do Facebook Journalism Project, iniciativa lançada em 2017 a fim de estreitar os laços e fomentar o setor jornalístico através de iniciativas como financiamento de projetos, treinamentos, e parcerias com agências de fact-checking. A pesquisa também se dedica a analisar dois momentos de crise: a seleção de conteúdo no Trending Topics e a exclusão da fotografia “The Terror of War”. Tomadas como “controvérsias algorítmicas”, estas situações ocorridas em 2016 nos permitem compreender como um crescente questionamento da suposta neutralidade das agências do Facebook foi decisivo nos ajustes propostos para a plataformização do jornalismo. Nosso referencial teórico é composto por conceitos vinculados aos Science and Technology Studies, mais especificamente aos Estudos de Plataforma, aos Estudos Críticos de Algoritmos e à Teoria Ator-Rede. A cartografia de controvérsias e o modelo “the connective approach” (VAN DIJCK, 2013a) são nossas principais inspirações metodológicas. Dentre os autores com os quais dialogamos estão Van Dijck et al. (2018), Helmond (2015), Helmond et al. (2018), Bucher (2012 e 2018), Bucher e Helmond (2017), Plantin et. al (2018), Nieborg e Poell (2018), Gillespie (2010, 2018), Napoli e Caplan (2018).

- by Amanda Chevtchouk Jurno
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- Cartography, Algorithms, Journalism, Digital Journalism

The article focuses on the reconfiguration of analogue instant photography (Polaroid-like) in the digital age. Drawing on STS literature on the mutual shaping of users and technology, and on anthropology and the history of photography, it adopts the concept of " photo-object " to discuss how the digitalization of photography stimulated a change in the cultural significance of materiality in the context of aspirational amateur photography , thus showing how this triggered a redefinition of instant photography as a more authentic form of aspirational practice. The article is based on empirical data collected during a multi-sited ethnography conducted in Italy between 2014 and 2015. By focusing on Polaroid's " objectness " and its dialectical tension with the immateriality of digital photography, the paper highlights an increasingly common process of circulation between analogue and digital photographic environments and argues that this process of circulation can be conceived in terms of a " remediation " process between analogue and digital practices.

- by Sergio Minniti
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- Photography, Digital Photography, Photography Theory, Materiality (Anthropology)

En este capítulo se ofrece un argumento radical y poco convencional.
En la medicina biomédica contemporánea, denominada medicina
científica, el "hacer historias clínicas" y el "hacer clínica" no
son dos cosas diferentes. Por tanto, aquí se mostrará cómo, cuando
un estudiante neófito de medicina aprende a hacer historias clínicas,
de manera paralela y simultánea aprende a ser médico.

Course description and objectives: This course will offer a survey of the main themes, theories, and approaches developed in the field of Science and Technology Studies (STS). Graduate students will have the opportunity to explore concepts and methods that will enable them to develop their projects in the history of science and technology according to traditional and current theoretical debates in the field. In the last three decades history of science and technology scholars have contributed enormously to the development of STS, and at the same time have adopted concepts and shared perspectives of contiguous disciplines, such as sociology and anthropology of science. The selection of readings described in detail below, reflects this consolidated and fruitful interdisciplinary approach. In addition to this, in recent years engineering and medical schools, but also physical and biological sciences department, have introduced social studies of science in their curricula. For this reason, while it is intended to satisfy the needs of graduate students in the history department (and other humanities and social science units) this course offers students from other disciplines, including engineering, medicine, and geo-physical sciences, an opportunity to engage critically with problems and questions concerning the social impact and relevance of scientific research and applied science.

Wie hängen Innovation und Wandel bei den Schweizerischen Bundesbahnen zusammen? Woher kam der Druck zur Veränderung? Wer generierte innovative Ideen generiert und wie konnten sich diese durchsetzen? So lauten einige Kernfragen der Untersuchung von Gisela Hürlimann, die sich als eine „integrative Unternehmensgeschichte“ der SBB versteht. Die zweite Hälfte der 1960er-Jahre, in der die die Bundesbahnen in eine Defizitphase eintraten, stellt den Ausgangspunkt dar. Anhand der Projekte für eine automatische Zugsicherung, für den Taktfahrplan Schweiz und für eine Schnellbahn Bern-Zürich spannt die Autorin einen weiten Bogen in die Gegenwart. Darin zeigt sie, wie das Bahnunternehmen um die Mitte der 1980er-Jahre dank cleverem Marketing und dank dem Mega-Trend Umweltschutz den Turnaround schaffte und die historische Kurve von einer „public social railway“ zu einer „public business railway“ nahm. Zu dieser Erfolgsstory gehört die „Bahn 2000“, die 1984/85 das unbeliebte Projekt der „Neuen Haupttransversalen“ (NHT) ablöste. Dabei kommt auch die Sichtweise der Ingenieure, Betriebswirtschaftler und Generaldirektoren nicht zu kurz, mit denen die Autorin Interviews für eine „Oral History“ der SBB führte. Mit den Bundesbahnen steht auch die schweizerische Verkehrspolitik in ihrem Verhältnis zu Europa im Fokus der Untersuchung. Denn die Untersuchung bezieht systematisch Impulse mit ein, die von der „Internationalität der Eisenbahn“ und von der EG-Liberalisierungspolitik ausgingen. Gleichzeitig liefert die Darstellung am Beispiel des SBB-Spinnerclubs auch eine exemplarische Analyse vom Funktionieren eines intraorgansationalen Innovationsnetzwerks, dessen „Subversionen“ dem gesamten Betrieb nützten. Die Darstellung endet in den späten 1990er-Jahren, als die Bahn- und Unternehmensreform in Kraft trat und als die SBB eine Pionierrolle beim „European Train Control System“ (ETCS) übernahmen. Angesichts der Herausforderungen durch zukünftige Bahreformen, durch die NEAT und die Veränderungen der Lebensgewohnheiten – Wohnen über den Gleisen und Reisen durch die ganze Nacht? – scheinen die Weichen wieder offen für eine stets neue „Eisenbahn der Zukunft“.

Open access: https://www.berghahnbooks.com/title/LeibingPreventing
This book is about the drastic change in the conceptualization of dementia and the impact this change has or may have on individuals and, more generally, on the landscapes of aging in different societies.A recent report by the Lancet commission in 2017 which received significant media attention, suggests that one third of the cases of AD could be prevented, mostly through lifestyle interventions. In other words, general public health recommendations easily merge with ideas of active and successful aging – for instance, avoiding physical inactivity, smoking, and unhealthy food – are now also applicable to dementia. In contrast to a former strict neuro-centric perspective on the disease, the body and by this, technologies and practices related to the whole body are becoming relevant again.

- by Annette Leibing
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- Sociology, Anthropology, Medical Anthropology, Philosophy of Science

Este volumen pretende hacer visible, a una audiencia especializada como no-especialista, diferentes comprensiones y aplicaciones del término Smart City, proponiendo problemáticas, casos y conceptualizaciones que van más allá de una visión tecnologizada del urbanismos smart. Permite pluralizar y a la vez tomar distancia crítica de esta ola de Ciudades Inteligentes, mostrando las múltiples formas de inteligencia que adopta la vida urbana, que pueden ir desde la recomposición de espacios públicos hasta sofisticadas formas de gestión en transporte. Digámoslo de otra manera: aquellos productos diseñados y definidos por “sistemas expertos”, no tiene el monopolio de lo smart, y el prototipo espontáneo de una cancha de fútbol o de una barrera anti-ruido elaborada por un colectivo ciudadano puede ser tan inteligente o más que que un brazalete wearable. Lo importante es estar atento a esas pulsiones y gestos, sensores y desplazamientos urbanos
En suma, la vocación de este libro es abrir el debate sobre las Smart Cities, explorando a partir de diferentes perspectivas y disciplinas (Antropología, Diseño, Ingeniería, Sociología, Arquitectura, Políticas Públicas...), la pregunta sobre qué implica una práctica urbana inteligente y sus efectos en la estructuración de la ciudad y sus discursos.

- by Martín Tironi and +2
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- Mobility/Mobilities, science and technology studies (STS), Smart City, Open Source Urbanism

Increasingly, a range of 'things' (e.g. infrastructure, data, knowledge, bodies, etc.) are configured and/or reconfigured as assets, or capitalized property. Accumulation strategies have changed as a result of this assetization process, which characterizes a particular form of technoscientific capitalism. Rather than entrepreneurial strategies based on commodity production, technoscientific capitalism is increasingly underpinned by rentiership, or the appropriation of value through ownership rights (e.g. intellectual property), monopoly conditions, and regulatory or market devices and practices (e.g. investment dispute courts, exclusivity agreements, etc.). While rentiership and rent-seeking are often presented as negative phenomena (e.g. distorting markets, unearned income) in both neoclassical and Marxist literatures – and much in-between – it is my intention in this paper to unpack rentiership as an increasingly constitutive political-economic process underpinning technoscientific capitalism. Rather than being framed as a problematic 'side-effect' of capitalism, I argue that rentiership can help us to understand how different forms of value extraction are constituted by and come to constitute different forms of technoscience. This has significant analytical, political, and normative implications for understanding the relationship between science, innovation, and business (e.g. how do rentier rationales configure research agendas, how does innovation enable rentiership, what are the consequences for social equity, etc.).

- by Kean Birch
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- Entrepreneurship, History of Science and Technology, Sociology, Economic Sociology

This essay examines five ideal–typical conceptions of politics in science and technology studies. Rather than evaluating these conceptions with reference to a single standard, the essay shows how different conceptions of politics serve distinct purposes: normative critique, two approaches to empirical description, and two views of democracy. I discuss each conception of politics with respect to how well it fulfills its apparent primary purpose, as well as its implications for the purpose of studying a key issue in contemporary democratic societies: the politicization of science. In this respect, the essay goes beyond classifying different conceptions of politics and also recommends the fifth conception as especially conducive to understanding and shaping the processes whereby science becomes a site or object of political activity. The essay also employs several analytical distinctions to help clarify the differences among conceptions of politics: between science as ‘political’ (adjective) and science as a site of ‘politics’ (noun), between spatial-conceptions and activity-conceptions of politics, between latent conflicts and actual conflicts, and between politics and power. The essay also makes the methodological argument that the politics of science and technology is best studied with concepts and methods that facilitate dialogue between actors and analysts. The main goal, however, is not to defend a particular view of politics, but to promote conversation on the conceptions of politics that animate research in social studies of science and technology.

Since the early 1990s ‘Dutch Design’ has become increasingly visible in the international design field. Publications that attempt to explain its essence appeal to the idea that Dutch Design artefacts are somehow ‘typically Dutch’, where ‘Dutchness’ is explained as a mix of recurring factors: conceptualism, Calvinism, the artificially constructed and densely populated Dutch landscape, the Polder Model, social responsibility, entrepreneurship, and a shortage of natural materials and industries, among others. However, the problem with such narratives is that they participate in the construction of an idealized Dutch cultural identity and its material production rather than analytically describing their constructions. Perhaps this explains why these reiterations never seem able to settle the controversy once and for all so that the quest for the essence of Dutch Design continues until today. The purpose of this paper can be stated quite simply: it too will look for the essence of Dutch Design. But it will do so wisely advised by Bruno Latour who argues that “an essence does not lie in a definition but in a practice, a situated, material practice that ties a whole range of heterogeneous phenomena in a certain specific way.” Thus, rather than asking what Dutch Design is, this essay asks: how is it practiced? The hypothesis is that the essence of Dutch Design can be found not in abstract definitions of Dutchness but in situated material practices. As a case study this paper pragmatically traces the discursive and material construction of Autarchy (2010), a design project by studio Formafantasma, into an icon of Dutch Design [Figs. 1-4]. To do so, it employs Albena Yaneva’s adaptation of Bruno Latour’s ‘Actor-Network-Theory’ (ANT) to the study of design as a vector between studio practices and broader social and material networks. This framework allows this paper to abstain from generalizations and stereotypes of Dutch culture and identity and instead to provide a detailed description of Autarchy as a “star-like connecting site,” as a local place that idiosyncratically ties together a host of heterogeneous elements between the studio, the home, the media and the market. As such, this paper offers an original contribution to the study of design as a situated material practice at the intersection of so-called ‘micro’ analyses and ‘macro’ frameworks.

- by Joana Meroz
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- Design, Design History, Material Culture Studies, Actor Network Theory

In this commentary I argue that rather than going beyond race, we need to 'stay with the trouble' of race (Haraway 2016). Race, I want to suggest, is precisely 'trouble' because it is produced and sustained in everyday practices. To make this more tangible, I will zoom in on one specific case, a homicide case, that was eventually solved through forensic technologies and attend to the impact of the case on society. Analyzing responses in the media to the identification of suspect, I focus on the sense of community that emerged and unravel how race came to play a role. To push the point that we need to attend to the intricacies of race, I will switch focus from an analysis of race in relation to difference, to race in relation to sameness. As I argue while differences tend to be politicized, sameness tends to remain curiously apolitical and to function as the baseline. Here I suggest to differentiate between sameness as otherness and sameness as us-ness. My analyses is aimed at inviting us to stay curious about what race is made to be in practice, how it manifests and what politics it does.

- by Amade M'charek
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- Critical Race Studies, Forensic Genetics, Critical Race Theory, STS (Anthropology)

Proposes that we explore the way infrastructure (communications, networks, transport, buildings etc) structures intimate relations. These are PROOFS; don't quote from them without checking the final version: SIGNS Vol. 41, No. 2 (Winter... more

- by Ara Wilson
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- Queer Studies, Feminist Theory, STS (Anthropology), Architectural Theory

The complexity of everyday life challenges the assumption that there is one single universal reality that everyone in the world should share. This introductory essay introduces the notion of the “World Multiple,” with which the chapters in this volume collectively explore how to understand the multiplicity of the worlds that people experience and generate in their everyday practices. The introduction traces the genealogies of “worlding” to mobilize it as a post/decolonial, non-Newtonian, material-semiotic analytic for understanding how worlds are made through quotidian practices in multiple ways. It argues that this approach requires attention to various practices that generate space-time, and to the everyday politics enacted in those worlds. It then introduces chapters that examine how humans and non-humans caught amongst the social and material legacies of colonialism, capitalism, and the hegemony of modernist technoscience strive to craft worlds worth living in diverse manifestations. This essay addresses the importance of close ethnographic attention to people’s worlding practices and to explore possibilities of life in a world respectful of multiplicity.

- by Grant Otsuki and +1
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- Anthropology, Postcolonial Studies, Social and Cultural Anthropology, Indigenous Knowledge
- by Joana Meroz
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- Design, Design History, Material Culture Studies, Actor Network Theory

A Special Issue of "Tecnoscienza - The Italian Journal of Science & Technology Studies" on the notion of “digital circulation”, aimed developing bridges beetwen science and technology studies, media and communication studies around issues... more

- by Paolo Magaudda and +5
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- Sociology, Information Technology, Communication, Media Studies
- by Maria Prieto
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- Design practice, STS/ANT, Politics of Nature, Making Things Public

Article publié en 1991 dans la revue Critique, pour un volume coordonné par Vincent Descombes et consacré à quelques tendances émergentes des sciences sociales. Vincent m'avait demandé de discuter les thèses de Michel Callon et Bruno Latour alors en pleine effervescence. La Théorie de l'Acteur-Réseau (ANT pour Actor-Network Theory) n'était pas encore devenue un des principaux standards du champ des Science & Technology Studies (STS). L'archive n'étant plus accessible sur le web après la disparition d'un site de labo, j'ai reçu plusieurs demandes. Voici donc l'article scanné à partir d'un tiré à part, avec un téléphone, en plein confinement (12 avril 2020) - c'est un peu de travers, désolé, ça avait l'air carré sur l'écran !

- by Francis Chateauraynaud
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- Sociology, Philosophy of Science, Pragmatism, Sociology of Knowledge

This thesis investigates futurists’ capacity to engage with the future. Inspired by actor–network theory (ANT) and the laboratory studies of Karen Knorr-Cetina and Bruno Latour, it identifies and characterises two aspects of capacity to engage with the future. These aspects are the relational and processual, with a focus on the future and time. The relational aspect is identified through drawing on Knorr-Cetina’s work on the post-social epistemic object relations. The processual aspect is identified through drawing on Latour’s work on the construction of facts involving inversion and the process of turning time.
The theoretical framework that informs this study combines ANT (through the work by Michel Callon, Latour and John Law) and process philosophy, and is particularly concerned with those principles relating to time. This thesis begins by reviewing the FS literature through the analytical lens of Latour’s characterisation of modernity as being the ongoing separation of the social and nature through the work of purification and translation. This thesis identifies similar work of purification and translation in FS and contends that futurists are being distracted by this from resolving the problems they attribute to the purification work. The thesis argues that futurists could start to overcome this problem by re-establishing the connection between the work of translation and the work of purification.
This thesis develops a way through this dilemma through close analysis of empirical data on how FS students and graduates actually engage with the future. The data was collected from 28 hours of in-depth semi-structured life course interviews with students (past and present) of postgraduate futures studies educational courses internationally. The data analysis identifies two types of epistemic object relations, an unfolding relation and a co-creating relation. It also identifies two types of processes for engaging with the future, a reflection process and a process of turning to the conditions. Participant data shows that futurists’ capacity to engage with the future, for both the relational and processual aspects, are similar to but extend beyond those identified by Knorr-Cetina and Latour. Whereas Knorr-Cetina characterised scientists as ordering their relation to the future as the unfolding of knowledge towards goals or targets under controlled conditions, the research participants in this study are characterised as going beyond that. Their relation to knowledge is to be actively poised for, yet aware of, the limits to knowing and responding, and the emergence out of inexistence of new and novel events and entities from the world where they have no control. Whereas Latour identified the reflection process of researchers as the ordering and manipulating of entities along a (standard) time framework, the participants in this study go beyond that. This thesis identifies a process wherein they turn to the conditions from which the future is being generated to identify change in what appears to be stable or static. This often involves objects that specify the conditions for change without fixed time frameworks.
Comparisons between the participants at different stages of their studies suggest that futures studies postgraduate education is perhaps relevant to differences in capacity to engage with the future.

- by Po-Wei Wang
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- science and technology studies (STS), Socialogy, STS/ANT

Eighty years ago, Nicholas Berdyaev cautioned that new technological problems needed to be addressed with a new philosophical anthropology. Today, the transhumanist goal of mind uploading is perceived by many theologians and philosophers to be dangerous due to its violation of the human person. I contrast transhumanist " patternist " views of the person with Brent Waters's Augustinian view of the technological pilgrim, Celia Deane-Drummond's evolutionary Thomistic view of humanity, and Francis Fukuyama's insistence on the inviolability of " Factor X ". These latter three thinkers all disagree with the patternist position, but their views are also discordant with each other. This disagreement constitutes a challenge for people of faith confronting transhumanism—which view is to be taken right? I contend that Science, Technology and Society (STS) studies can enrich our understanding of the debates by highlighting the transmutation of philosophical view into scientific theory and the intermingled nature of our forms of knowledge. Furthermore, I contend that STS helps Christians understand the evolution of their own anthropologies and suggests some prospects for future theological anthropology.

- by Levi Checketts
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- Philosophical Anthropology, Theological Anthropology, Transhumanism, STS/ANT

A growing number of sociologists have recently addressed how meanings become materialized, how the built environment structures social interactions, or how it conveys power. This literature has contributed to a better understanding of the cultural dynamics of different material phenomena, but it has not led to a broader theoretical clarification on how the material world influences meaning-making practices and is further shaped by the variety of socially available meanings. In conversation with the recent renewal of pragmatism in sociology and the interdisciplinary literature on materiality, this article proposes a theory of situated semio-material practices that combines Bourdieusian field analysis with Peircean semiotics. Those sets of practices orient how the built environment is produced, understood, and how it becomes incorporated in circuits of social practice. Ultimately, this article argues that semio-material practices can be employed to analyze the three moments of the objectification of the built environment: design, construction, and inhabiting.

- by Jose Henrique Bortoluci
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- Semiotics, Cultural Studies, Social Theory, Field Theory
- by Alessandro Mongili
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- Boundary objects, Multiplicity, Information Infrastructure, STS/ANT

This article examines the process of constructing, repairing, and improvising “human–signal assemblages” by drawing on in-depth interviews and virtual ethnography regarding the engineering of Wi-Fi connectivity in Taipei, Taiwan. It is demonstrated that spatial, temporal, infrastructural, and embodied orchestrations of Wi-Fi signals both reinforce and challenge prescribed ways of conducting daily tasks. Continuity and change, enacted by attempts to incorporate Wi-Fi signals into daily urban life, are explored by discussing a wide range of practices performed by government entities, local companies and initiatives, and users themselves. Particular attention is paid to the ways in which machines, the city landscape, discourses, maps, and signs grow and multiply, as well as intersect and intervene with each other at various levels, locales, and stages of establishing Wi-Fi connections. The article thus argues for the importance of “machine juggling” as a skillful performance that mends, maintains, and improvises Wi-Fi-enabled urban everyday rhythms.

- by Sung-Yueh Perng
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- Taiwan Studies, STS (Anthropology), Sociology of Everyday Life, Open Innovation

Formålet med artiklen er at afsøge, hvad videnskabs- og teknologi- studier eller Science and Technology Studies (STS) tilbyder humaniora og samfundsvidenskaberne med det nybrud, der er blevet kaldt den ontologiske vending. Med udgangspunkt i en beskrivelse af den onto- logiske vending i antropologi og STS, defineres vendingen som en sær- lig interesse for verdens beskaffenhed, og for spørgsmålet om hvordan man forholder sig analytisk til det, som findes, velvidende at det væ- rende også tilvejebringes gennem analyse. Den ontologiske vending markerer grænsen for et diskussionsrum, der spænder over flere fag- områder. I artiklen gennemgår jeg aktuelle positioner i diskussionen og identificerer praktiske konsekvenser, der følger af interessen for ontologi. Jeg konkluderer, at et ontologisk studie er kendetegnet ved opmærksomhed på processer, hvor igennem teori og empiri påvirker hinanden i et omfang, så man ikke længere kan udgrænse teorien som en forklaringsmodel. Dermed bliver begreber markeringer af et teore- tisk udgangspunkt snarere end arkimediske fikspunkter i analysen. I ontologiske studier indgår det deskriptive og det normative i en vek- selvirkning og rejser det uundgåelige spørgsmål: Hvad kan jeg sige, og hvad vil jeg sige på baggrund af det nærværende empirisk-teoretisk materiale? Artiklen giver eksempler på ontologiske studier og illustrerer gennem eksemplerne hvordan den ontologiske vending udfordrer grænser mellem teori og empiri, analyse og intervention.

- by Brit Ross Winthereik
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- STS (Anthropology), STS/ANT

Population registers are statistical and administrative devices aimed at providing an accurate and dynamic picture of the population, and thereby allowing authorities to acquire information on its composition and the ways people are located and move within the territory. Even though these devices are theoretically expected to merely register social reality without affecting it, population registers do have performative effects, which differ from those of other demographic devices such as censuses and are more explicitly political. First, population registers turn the material relations between people and space into a formal act called registration, and produce a legal status called residency, which is the precondition for exercising many rights. Moreover, despite their apparent inclusivity, population registers are structurally restricted to certain components of the population. Only some ways of dwelling and living in the space are considered legitimate, and only these are accepted legally and permit registration. In analysing the performative power of population registers in Italy and how it changes over time, this article seeks to contribute to the debate on performativity by shifting the focus from the socio-technical dimension, typical of Science and Technology Studies (STS), to the socio-legal one, less explored within the scholarship on demographic devices.

- by enrico gargiulo
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- Sociology, Political Sociology, Social Demography, Demography

Purpose – This paper asks “Why is the future in futures studies plural?” The attitude toward inquiry,
based on post-actor-network theory (ANT) literature, positions philosophical questions about the
ontological character of the future within the context of “planning” for it (i.e. in practice). Multiplicity, as
a post-ANT sensibility, helps one make sense of the empirical materials. This paper examines the
possibility that rather than being alternatives to one another, plural futures and the singular future might
co-exist in practice, and, thus, constitute a multiplicity.
Design/methodology/approach – In this case study, “planning” is narrative scenario planning. The
second author facilitates dialogue-based long-term strategic scenario planning processes, primarily in
Scandinavia and Northern Europe, and contributes a wealth of professional experience to the project.
The first author, an academic, shadows the second author. This paper examines experiential and
observational data for evidence of the ontological character of the future. Elements of a typical scenario
planning process, in this case, about the possibility of crewless (i.e. unmanned) shipping vessels are
demonstrated – although, insight into the crewless ship is submerged by our analytical attentiveness to
the ontology of the future.
Findings – The findings bear on what sort of “object” the future is. Practices associated with planning
for the future appear to transform it so that one future becomes many, and, without irony, managing the
growing number of futures seems to be a core function of planning for the future. The implication is that
neither plural futures nor the singular future is – individually – satisfactory to capture what is found in
practice. It is both plural and singular; ontologically, it is the future multiple.
Originality/value – The original contribution is in demonstrating how plural futures and the singular
future co-exist in practice. Thus, an eclipse of the future by futures can only ever be partial. For “futures”
to be conceptually potent, “the future” must be at least provisionally believable and occasionally useful.
Otherwise, if “the future” were so preposterous an idea, then “futures” would cease to be a critical
alternative to it. Futures needs the future; they are relationally bound together in a multiplicity. This paper
considers what such a logical reality implies for a field that distances itself from the future and
self-identifies with futures.
Keywords Ontology, Scenario planning, Actor-network theory, Maritime industry, Multiplicity,
Science and technology studies

- by Nicholas J Rowland and +1
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- Sociology, Future Studies, Ontology, Actor Network Theory

O artigo investiga os textos de dois GT da Compós: Epistemologia da Comunicação e Comunicação e Cibercultura. O objetivo é testar a hipótese de que o campo da comunicação no Brasil ainda é pouco sensível às teorias neomaterialistas, sendo que as abordagens sobre os objetos e o campo da comunicação são desenvolvidas a partir de um viés antropocêntrico. Foram analisados 60 artigos. Os dados mostram que, no corpus geral, 38% dos textos são antropocêntricos, sendo que desses, 27% estão no GT Comunicação e Cibercultura e 50% no GT Epistemologia da Comunicação. Os textos não antropocêntricos são 13% do corpus geral (sendo 13% em cada um dos GT). Embora a abordagem não probabilística usada na investigação não permita generalizar os achados, os resultados encontrados corroboram com a hipótese levantada, indicando que, apesar da emergente sensibilidade às abordagens neomaterialistas, o viés antropocêntrico ainda é majoritário. Palavras-chave: Comunicação. Antropocentrismo. Compós. Neomateria...

- by André Lemos
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- Epistemology, Media Studies, Actor Network Theory, New Materialisms