scholarly journals Discursive Contextures of Science: Euro/West-Centrism and Science and Technology Studies

2016 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 193 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amit Prasad
Keyword(s):  
Network Theory ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Embryonic Stem ◽  
Modern Science ◽  
Actor Network Theory ◽  
Scientific Practices ◽  
Technology Studies ◽  
Knowledge And Practice

Science and Technology Studies (STS) by the very act of showing the multiplicity, contingency, and context-dependence of scientific knowledge and practice, provincialized modern science. Postcolonial interventions within STS have pursued this goal even further. Nevertheless, Euro/West-centrism continues to inflect not only scientific practices and lay imaginaries, but also sociological and historical analyses of sciences. In this article, drawing on my own training within STS – first under J.P.S. Uberoi, who was concerned with structuralist analysis of modernity and science, and thereafter under Andy Pickering, when we focused on material agency and temporal emergence and extensively engaged with Actor Network Theory - I emphasize the continuing role of Euro/West-centric discourses in defining the “self” and the “other” and in impacting epistemological and ontological interventions. More broadly, building on a concept of Michael Lynch’s, I call for excavation and analysis of discursive contextures of sciences. In the second section of the article, through a brief analysis of embryonic stem cell therapy in a clinic in Delhi, I show how with shifting transnational landscape of technoscience certain discursive contextures are being “deterritorialized” and left “stuttering.”

scholarly journals On Theory–Methods Packages in Science and Technology Studies

2021 ◽  
pp. 016224392110402
Author(s):  
Antti Silvast ◽  
Mikko J. Virtanen
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Review Essay ◽  
Network Theory ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Actor Network Theory ◽  
Theory Method ◽  
Technology Studies ◽  
Research Designs ◽  
Selection Of

Our review essay contributes to the long-standing and vibrant discussion in science and technology studies (STS) on methods, methodologies, and theory–method relationships. We aim to improve the reflexivity of research by unpacking the often implicit assumptions that imbue research conduct and by offering practical tools through which STS researchers can recognize their research designs and think through them in a new way. To achieve these aims, we analyze different compositions of theories, methods, and empirics in three different STS approaches—actor–network theory, the biography of artifacts and practices, and ethnomethodology—by employing the concept of a theory–methods package (TMP). A selection of theoretical cornerstone texts and case studies in infrastructure research from each tradition serves as our material. Our findings point, first, to differences between the TMPs of the reviewed approaches and to the internal diversity of theory–method relationships in each approach. Second, we found some intriguing similarities between the approaches and discuss potential complementarities of their theory–method fits.

scholarly journals ¿Distanciamiento social o distanciamiento de lo social? Un enfoque no antropocéntrico en antropología

2021 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cristian Terry
Keyword(s):  
Network Theory ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Actor Network Theory ◽  
Actor Network ◽  
Technology Studies

Los Estudios de Ciencia y Tecnología (Science and Technology Studies [STS]) y la Teoría del Actor-Red (Actor-Network Theory [ANT]), junto con la antropología “más allá de lo humano”, promueven un enfoque no antropocéntrico en las ciencias sociales, donde las entidades no humanas hacen parte del mundo social. Desde dicha perspectiva no antropocéntrica, este artículo tiene como objetivo cuestionar el uso de “distanciamiento social” como un término preciso, donde el calificativo “social” se asocia únicamente a seres humanos. Si el distanciamiento es un concepto clave para prevenir el contagio de COVID-19 entre seres humanos, sería más correcto hablar de distanciamiento físico o corporal. Al hablar de distanciamiento social, en realidad estamos distanciando lo social, reduciendo su complejidad, ya que está compuesto por entidades que no son necesariamente humanas o incluso visibles a nuestros ojos, como el nuevo coronavirus. Este artículo invita a buscar términos alternativos al concepto de “distanciamiento social” que nos permitan expresar mejor la complejidad de lo social de una manera menos antropocéntrica.

scholarly journals Writing Nature

2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 4 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristin Asdal ◽  
Gro Birgit Ween
Keyword(s):  
Network Theory ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Actor Network Theory ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Actor Network ◽  
Technology Studies ◽  
Clear Cut

<div>This special issue of the Nordic Journal of Science and Technology Studies is interested in how nature, in different versions and forms, is invited into our studies, analyses, and stories. How is it that we “write nature”? How is it that we provide space for, and actually describe the actors, agents, or surroundings, in our stories and analyses? The articles in the issue each deal with different understandings of both the practices of writing and the introduction of various natures into these. In this introduction to the issue the editors engage with actor-network theory as a material semiotic resource  for writing nature. We propose to foreground actor-network theory as a writing tool, at the expense of actor-network theory as a distinct vocabulary. In doing this and pointing out the semiotic origins to material-semiotics we also want to  problematize a clear-cut material approach to writing nature.</div>

scholarly journals Symmetry as a Guide to Post-truth Times: A Response to Lynch

2021 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 395-411
Author(s):  
Steve Fuller
Keyword(s):  
Social Epistemology ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Thomas Hobbes ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Truth Condition ◽  
Carl Schmitt ◽  
Symmetry Principle ◽  
Technology Studies

Abstract William Lynch has provided an informed and probing critique of my embrace of the post-truth condition, which he understands correctly as an extension of the normative project of social epistemology. This article roughly tracks the order of Lynch’s paper, beginning with the vexed role of the ‘normative’ in Science and Technology Studies, which originally triggered my version of social epistemology 35 years ago and has been guided by the field’s ‘symmetry principle’. Here the pejorative use of ‘populism’ to mean democracy is highlighted as a failure of symmetry. Finally, after rejecting Lynch’s appeal to a hybrid Marxian–Darwinism, Carl Schmitt and Thomas Hobbes are contrasted en route to what I have called ‘quantum epistemology’.

scholarly journals It’s Important to Go to the Laboratory: Malte Ziewitz Talks with Michael Lynch

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 366 ◽  
Author(s):  
Malte Ziewitz ◽  
Michael Lynch
Keyword(s):  
Social Studies ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Blow Up ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Laboratory Studies ◽  
Technology Studies ◽  
Social Studies Of Science ◽  
Origin Stories

Why would anyone still want to go to the laboratory in 2018? In this interview, Michael Lynch answers this and other questions, reflecting on his own journey in, through, and alongside the field of science and technology studies (STS). Starting from his days as a student of Harold Garfinkel’s at UCLA to more recent times as editor of Social Studies of Science, Lynch talks about the rise of origin stories in the field; the role of ethnomethodology in his thinking; the early days of laboratory studies; why “turns” and “waves” might better be called “spins”; what he learned from David Edge; why we should be skeptical of the presumption that STS enhances the democratization of science; and why it might be time to “blow up STS”––an appealing idea that Malte Ziewitz takes up in his reflection following the interview.

scholarly journals Art&science. Autoetnografia artystki realizującej projekty w laboratoriach biologicznych

2017 ◽  
Vol 61 (3) ◽  
pp. 103-126
Author(s):  
Karolina Żyniewicz
Keyword(s):  
Network Theory ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Actor Network Theory ◽  
Ethnographic Research ◽  
Art And Science ◽  
Science Field ◽  
Actor Network

The aim of the text is to present the use of the analytical autoethnographic method in studying the “art&science” phenomenon. It is attempt to show that the role of the artist can combine with the role of the ethnographer. The objects of study are the multilevel relations emerging during the realization of artistic projects in biological laboratories. These relations concern both humans (the artist, the scientists) and non-humans (laboratory organisms, equipment). On the basis of actor-network theory, the author presents how the liminal status of ethnographic research is modified when it connects with art. The form of conducting the research is both an example of activity in the art and science field and a new methodological proposal for the study of science and technology.

scholarly journals Legal Pluralism and Science and Technology Studies: Exploring Sources of the Legal Pluriverse

2022 ◽  
pp. 016224392110696
Author(s):  
Bertram Turner ◽  
Melanie G. Wiber
Keyword(s):  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Special Section ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Legal Pluralism ◽  
Sole Source ◽  
Technological Transformation ◽  
Technology Studies ◽  
Global Modernity ◽  
Normative Order

In introducing the contributions to this special section, we explore the links between social and juridical concepts of normativity and science and technology. We follow the Legal Pluralism challenge to the notion of state law as the sole source of normative order and point to how technological transformation creates a pluralistic legal universe that takes on new shapes under conditions of globalization. We promote a science and technology studies (STS)-inspired reworking of Legal Pluralism and suggest expanding the portfolio of legally effective regimes of ordering to include the normativity generated by materiality and technology. This normativity is amply demonstrated in the case studies included in the papers which make up this special section. We conclude that the inclusion of approaches developed in STS research helps analytically to overcome what we view as an incomplete law project, one unable to deal with the technicized lifeworlds of a global modernity. The contributions to this special section illustrate that technomaterial change cannot be understood without recognition of the role of normative impacts, and conversely, the legal pluriverse cannot be understood without recognition of the normative role of techno-material arrangements.

Virtual Witnessing in a Virtual Age

2008 ◽  
pp. 1064-1081
Author(s):  
Steve Woolgar ◽  
Catelijne Coopmans
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Modern Science ◽  
Data Networks ◽  
Technology Studies ◽  
Virtual Age ◽  
Early Emergence ◽  
Technical Capacity

Despite a substantial unfolding investment in Grid technologies (for the development of cyberinfrastructures or e-science), little is known about how, why and by whom these new technologies are being adopted or will be taken up. This chapter argues for the importance of addressing these questions from an STS (science and technology studies) perspective, which develops and maintains a working scepticism with respect to the claims and attributions of scientific and technical capacity. We identify three interconnected topics with particular salience for Grid technologies: data, networks, and accountability. The chapter provides an illustration of howthese topics might be approached from an STS perspective, by revisiting the idea of “virtual witnessing”—a key idea in understanding the early emergence of criteria of adequacy in experiments and demonstrations at the birth of modern science—and by drawing upon preliminary interviews with prospective scientist users of Grid technologies. The chapter concludes that, against the temptation to represent the effects of new technologies on the growth of scientific knowledge as straightforward and determinate, e-scientists are immersed in structures of interlocking accountabilities which leave the effects uncertain.

scholarly journals Reimagining the Big Data assemblage

2018 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 205395171881819 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Carter
Keyword(s):  
Big Data ◽  
Recent Work ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Data Analytics ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Big Data Analytics ◽  
Technology Studies ◽  
New Ways Of Working ◽  
Considerable Success

Recent work on Big Data and analytics reveals a tension between analyzing the role of emerging objects and processes in existing systems and using those same objects and processes to create new and purposeful forms of action. While the field of science and technology studies has had considerable success in pursuing the former goal, as Halford and Savage argue, there is an ongoing need to discover or invent ways to “do Big Data analytics differently.” In this commentary, I suggest that attempts to produce new ways of working with Big Data and analytics might be hindered by how science and technology studies-influenced scholars have conceptualized assemblages. While these scholars have foregrounded objects’ relations within existing assemblages, new materialist philosophers draw attention to properties of objects that transcend those relations and might indicate opportunities for more creative or generative uses of Big Data and analytics.

scholarly journals What makes a robot ‘social’?

2017 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 556-579 ◽  
Author(s):  
Raya A Jones
Keyword(s):  
Social Interactions ◽  
Network Theory ◽  
Science And Technology Studies ◽  
Science And Technology ◽  
Actor Network Theory ◽  
Humanoid Robots ◽  
Social Robotics ◽  
Actor Network ◽  
Social Agents ◽  
Level Of Analysis

Rhetorical moves that construct humanoid robots as social agents disclose tensions at the intersection of science and technology studies (STS) and social robotics. The discourse of robotics often constructs robots that are like us (and therefore unlike dumb artefacts). In the discourse of STS, descriptions of how people assimilate robots into their activities are presented directly or indirectly against the backdrop of actor-network theory, which prompts attributing agency to mundane artefacts. In contradistinction to both social robotics and STS, it is suggested here that to view a capacity to partake in dialogical action (to have a ‘voice’) is necessary for regarding an artefact as authentically social. The theme is explored partly through a critical reinterpretation of an episode that Morana Alač reported and analysed towards demonstrating her bodies-in-interaction concept. This paper turns to ‘body’ with particular reference to Gibsonian affordances theory so as to identify the level of analysis at which dialogicality enters social interactions.

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