Department of
Science and Technology Studies
HPSCGA42
Sociology of Science and
Technology
Syllabus
Session
2015-16
Web site
See Moodle
Moodle site
Timetable
www.ucl.ac.uk/timetable
Description
The aim of this course is to undertake a detailed examination of the sociological contribution to
the analysis of science and technology, mainly focusing on science. We will explore the
complex relationship between science, technology and society, including key sociological
accounts of the processes by which knowledge is constructed. The course will introduce you to
the main currents of thought and important empirical studies that have been influential in
sociology of science. The focus will be equally on contemporary as well as historical studies of
science and technology.
Key Information
Assessment
20%
Focused Review (1000 words)
80%
Essay (4000 words)
%
Prerequisites
none
Required texts
readings listed below
HPSC0000 Title
2013-14 syllabus
Module tutors
Module tutor
Dr Martin Savransky
Contact
m.savransky@ucl.ac.uk
Web
Sts.ucl.ac.uk/staff
Office location
22 Gordon Square, B14
Office hours:
TBC
and by appointment
Aims and objectives
aims
The aim of this course is to undertake a detailed examination of the sociological contribution to
the analysis of science and technology, mainly focusing on science. We will explore the complex
relationship between science, technology and society, including key sociological accounts of the
processes by which knowledge is constructed. The course will introduce you to the main
currents of thought and important empirical studies that have been influential in sociology of
science. The focus will be equally on contemporary as well as historical studies of science and
technology.
objectives
By the end of this module students should be able to:
• Have an understanding of how science works as a social process i.e. how technical knowledge
is produced by communities
• Have a detailed knowledge of the main theories in the sociology of science
• Be aware of the strengths and weaknesses of a range of sociological approaches to the
analysis of science and technology
• Be able to make links between sociological analyses of science and broader debates in
science policy, history of science and philosophy of science
Schedule
UCL Wk
Date
1
6
05/10
2
7
3
4
Topic
Activity
The Birth of Sociology of Science:
Mannheim and Merton
Read essential reading
12/10
Problematising Scientific
Knowledge: The Strong
Programme and the
microsociologies of Science
Read essential reading
8
19/10
Gender and Science: Is there
a Feminist Science?
Read essential reading
9
26/10
Science In Other Worlds:
Postcolonial Science Studies
Read essential reading
2
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5
10
6
11
7
12
02/11
Boundaries of Science
Read essential reading
Reading Week
No lectures
Read essential reading
16/11
Actor-Network Theory
8
13
23/11
The Mangle of Practice:
Agency and Ontology in
Scientific Practice
Read essential reading
9
14
30/11
After ANT: Relationality,
Constraints, and Care
Read essential reading
10
15
07/12
The Making of Scientific
Selves: History, Epistemology,
Subjectivity
Read essential reading
11
16
14/12
Beyond War, Peace:
Wondering About Science
Read essential reading
Reading list
For essential and recommended readings see Module Plan.
Textbooks
There are several (fairly) recent introductory textbooks on the sociology of science, and,
although the module does not follow a textbook as suck, you are encouraged to purchase
one. They provide accessible introductions to many of the topics we will cover and are worth
reading through for a ‘bird’s eye’ overview of the field.
•
•
•
•
Yearley, Steve (2005), Making Sense of Science: Understanding the Social Study of
Science (London: Sage) [A good overview, with a leaning towards more
contemporary issues] Abbreviated to SY on this reading list;
Bucchi, Massimiano (2002), Science in Society: An Introduction to Social Studies of
Science (London: Routledge) [Well written, a little too concise in places but
particularly good if you are interested in public understanding/ communication of
science] Abbreviated to MB on this reading list;
Sismondo, Sergio (2010), An Introduction to Science and Technology Studies
nd
(Oxford: Blackwell) 2 Edition. [Another good introduction now in second edition,
with a greater leaning towards philosophy of science than the other texts].
Abbreviated to SS on this reading list.
David, Matthew (2005), Science in Society (Basingstoke: Palgrave). Tends to be
aimed more at sociology students, but still a good introduction particularly if you’re
interested in wider links with social theory Abbreviated to MD on this reading list.
A good general reference book that you should be aware of is:
Hackett, E.J. (et al.) (2007), The Handbook of science and technology studies (Cambridge,
Mass. ; London : MIT Press) (3rd ed)
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(Comprehensive overview of state of the art for the field; also the 1995 2
Jasanoff, S. et al., still has good, relevant overviews of topics)
nd
edition, edited by
Also:
Golinski, J. (1998), Making Natural Knowledge: Constructivism and the History of Science
(Cambridge University Press) - is an overview that specifically relates debates from this
course to history of science.
Module plan
Week 1: The Birth of Sociology of Science: Mannheim and Merton
In this session we will introduce some basic questions on what the sociology of science is,
as well as trace its beginnings prior to and in the work of Mannheim and Merton. Sociology
of science that followed Karl Mannheim ‘sociology of knowledge’ remained largely outside
STS, and the one that followed the work of Robert Merton was largely an institutional
sociology of scientists. We will explore the intellectual and historical reasons for their
respective approaches to the sociology of science, their connections with the broader
discipline of sociology and social theory, and we will and consider some of their implications.
Textbook Readings (optional: see Reading List section for references)
•
•
•
SY – Chapters 1
MD – Chapters 1 and 4
SS – Chapters 3 and 5
Essential Readings
•
•
Merton, RK (1973), ‘The Normative Structure of Science’, in The Sociology of
Science (Chicago: University of Chicago Press), Chapter 13 pp267-278 [UCL
Teaching Collection 1264].
Mannheim, K.(1936), ‘The Sociology of Knowledge’, in Ideology & Utopia (New York
& London: Harvest/HBJ Books). Chapter V. pp. 264-311
Recommended Readings
•
•
Weber, M. (1950[1905]), The Protestant Ethic and The Spirit of Capitalism. London:
George Allen & Unwin LTD. (esp. Chapter V, for his argument on Ascetism and the
spirit of capitalism)
Shapin, S (2008), The Scientific Life: A Moral History of a Late Modern Vocation
(University of Chicago Press)
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Jones, MP (2009), ‘Entrepreneurial Science: The Rules of the Game’, Social Studies
of Science 39(6): 821-851.
Kalleberg, R. (2007), ‘A Reconstruction of the Ethos of Science’. Journal of Classical
Sociology, 7, 137-160
Pels, D. (1996), ‘Karl Mannheim and the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge: Toward
a New Agenda’. Sociological Theory, 14, 1, 30-48
Cole, S. (2004),’Merton’s Contribution to the Sociology of Science’. Social Studies of
Science, 36 (6), 829-844
Evans, J. (2010), ‘Industry, collaboration, scientific sharing, and the dissemination of
knowledge’. Social Studies of Science, 40 (5), 757-791
Week 2: After Merton: The Strong Programme and Microsociology
The publication of T.S. Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions in the 1960s opened the
door to sociology of scientific knowledge. Although Kuhn himself eschewed this approach,
his theory implied that scientific change of a revolutionary order (the paradigm shift) is
rooted in the characteristics of the scientific community. Sociologists began to look at
knowledge itself as socially conditioned. The ‘strong programme’ argued that broad social
and political conditions could influence the content of scientific knowledge. Towards the end
of the 1970s sociology of science took a distinctly micro-social (and linguistic) turn. Detailed
studies of scientists, in laboratories or making claims in papers, became the preferred
methodology of ‘lab anthropologists’. The complex negotiations, contingencies and skills
involved in creating ‘a fact’ (and the way that these were all erased from the final product)
became the focus of attention.
Textbook Reading:
Either
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•
•
SY – Chapters 2 and 6 OR
MB – Chapter 4 OR
SS – Chapters 6, 10 OR
MD – Chapter 5
Essential Readings
•
•
Bloor, D (1976), Knowledge and Social Imagery (Routledge) (esp. Chapter 1 for the
classic statement of the tenets of the strong programme and the argument against a
‘sociology of error’ [Digitally available see p1]).
Michael Lynch, “Protocols, practices, and the reproduction of technique in molecular
biology,” British Journal of Sociology 53 (2) (2002): 203 – 220.
Recommended Readings
•
Bloor, D (1981), ‘The Strengths of the Strong Programme’, Phil. Soc. Sci., Vol.11
pp.199-213.
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•
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•
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Chalmers, A (1990), Science and its Fabrication (chapters 6-8) (a critical overview of
the strong programme)
Doing, P (2007), ‘Give me a Laboratory and I will Raise a Discipline: The Past,
Present and Future Politics of Laboratory Studies in STS’, in Hackett, EJ (et al)
(2007), The Handbook of Science and Technology studies (Cambridge, Mass.
; London : MIT Press) (3rd ed)
Mitroff, I (1974), ‘Norms and counter-norms in a select group of Apollo moon
scientists’, American Sociological Review Vol.39 pp579-95.
Michael Mulkay (1985), The Word and the World: Explorations in the Form of
Sociological Analysis (London: Allen and Unwin). (Seminal work on discourse
analysis and science) Laudan, L (1981), ‘The Pseudo-Science of Science’, Phil. Soc.
Sci., Vol.11 pp.173-98. (Scathing critique of the strong programme)
Mulkay, M (1976), ‘Norms and Ideology in Science’, Social Science Information 15:
637-656
Michael Mulkay and Nigel G. Gilbert, “Accounting for Error: How Scientists Construct
their Social World When they Account for Correct and Incorrect Belief,” Sociology 16
(1982): 165-183.
Woolgar, S (1988), Science: The Very Idea (Chichester: Ellis Harwood) Chapter 6. (A
good overview of some of the main claims of pioneering ethnographic works) (see
also chapters 4-5)
Michael Lynch, Scientific Practice and Ordinary Action: Ethnomethodology and
Social Studies of Science (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), chapter
1: “Ethnomethodology.”
Steve Woolgar ed. (1991), Knowledge and Reflexivity: New Frontiers in the
Sociology of Knowledge (London: Sage).
Examples of Ethnographies of Science:
•
•
Latour B & Woolgar S (1986), Laboratory Life: The Construction of Scientific Facts
(Princeton University Press) Chapter 2 and skim chapter 3 [ch.3 in TC 1701]. [Read
the Doing chapter’ Give me a laboratory…’ above first]
Knorr-Cetina, K (1999), Epistemic Cultures: How The Sciences Make Knowledge
(Chapters 1, 2 and either 3 or 4).
Case studies which draw directly or indirectly from the ‘strong programme’:
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Gillespie B et al (1982), ‘Carcinogenic Risk Assessment in the United States and
Great Britain: The Case of Aldrin/Dieldrin’, in Science in Context: Readings in the
Sociology of Science (Eds Barnes B and Edge D. Milton Keynes: Open University
Press) (Good, policy-relevant case-study) [Digitally available see p1].
Webster, A (1991), Science, Technology and Society (Chapter 2) (Overview,
includes discussion of the botanical classification study mentioned in lecture)
Collins, H and Pinch, T (1993), ‘The Germs of Dissent: Louis Pasteur and the Origins
of Life’, in The Golem: What Everyone Should Know About Science (Chapter 4)
[Digitally available see p1]
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Week 3: Gender and Science: Is there a Feminist Science?
Feminist critiques of science, until recently, tended to develop outside of mainstream
sociology of science, despite the overlap in perspectives. Studies range from institutional
questions (why so few women in science?) to epistemological questions (is there a distinctly
feminist science?). Feminist analyses of science form a burgeoning literature. Other
inequalities in science remain relatively under-researched.
Textbook Reading
Either
•
•
•
SY – Chapter 5 OR
SS – Chapter 7 OR
MD – Chapter 5
Essential Readings
•
Haraway, D. (1997), ‘Modest_Witness@Second_Millennium’, in
Modest_Witness@Second_Millennium.FemaleMan _Meets_OncoMouse™ (London:
Routledge) (Chapter 1) [Digitally available see p1]
Harding, S. (1991), Whose Science? Whose Knowledge? Thinking from Women’s Lives.
Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. Chapter 6: ‘“Strong Objectivity” and Socially Situated
Knowledge’.
©
•
Recommended Readings
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Schiebinger, L (1999), Has Feminism Changed Science? (Harvard Univ. Press)
Lederman, M and Bartsch, I (2001), The Gender and Science Reader (London:
Routledge) (Esp. sections 4 and 5)
Myerson, G (2000), Donna Haraway and GM Foods (Icon) (Brief, lucid exposition of
some of Haraway’s ideas)
Haraway, D (1999), ‘Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and
the Privilege of Partial Perspective’, in Biagioli, M (ed) The Science Studies Reader
(Routledge) and also in Lederman, M and Bartsch, I (2001), The Gender and
Science Reader (London: Routledge).
Oudshoorn, N (2004), "Astronauts in the Sperm World" : The Renegotiation of
Masculine Identities in Discourses on Male Contraceptives , Men and Masculinities,
Vol. 6, No. 4, 349-367 (2004)
Fox Keller, E. (1984), A Feeling for the Organism: The Life and Work of Barbara
McClintock.
New York: Henry Holt & Co.
Rose, H (1994), Love, Power and Knowledge: Toward a Feminist Transformation of
the Sciences (Cambridge: Polity) (Especially chapter 1; an earlier version can also
be found in the journal Signs Vol.9, 1983, pp73-90).
Harding, S (1998), Is Science Multicultural? (Indiana Univ Press) (esp. Chapters 5-
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•
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•
•
6).
Harding, S. (1991), Whose Science? Whose Knowledge? Thinking from Women’s
Lives. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.
Jacobus et al. (1990), Body/Politics: Women and the Discourses of Science. London:
Routledge.
Star, SL (1991), “Power, Technology and the Phenomenology of Conventions: On
Being Allergic to Onions” in Law, J (ed) A Sociology of Monsters: Essays on Power,
Technology and Domination (London and New York: Routledge) pp26-56. (An essay
on power, marginality and actor-network theory)
Fox Keller, E. (1984), A Feeling for the Organism: The Life and Work of Barbara
McClintock. New York: Henry Holt and Co
Week 4: Science in Other Worlds: Postcolonial Science Studies
Postcolonial critiques of science, until recently, tended to develop outside of mainstream
sociology of science, despite the overlap in perspectives. Studies range from institutional
questions (why so many white European scientists?) to historical and epistemological
questions (what is the relationship between Science and Colonialism? is Science a distinctly
Euorecentric project?) and ontological questions (are modern science’s presuppositions
about the nature of reality adequate beyond European realities? How many worlds are
there?). Is the politics of scientific knowledge also a politics of reality?
Essential Readings:
•
•
Santos, B. (2009) ‘A Non-Occidentalist West? Learned Ignorance and the Ecology of
Knowledge’, Theory, Culture & Society, 26, 103-125
Savransky, M. (2014), ‘In Praise of Hesitation: ‘Global’ Knowledge as a
Cosmopolitical Adventure’. In Keim W. et al. (eds.), Global Knowledge Production in
the Social Sciences. Farnham: Ashgate
Recommended Readings:
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Chakrabarty, D. (2000), Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical
Difference. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Gutiérrez, E. (2010), Decolonizing European Sociology: Transdisciplinary
Approaches. Farnham: Ashgate.
Mol, A. (1999), ‘Ontological Politics: A Word and Some Questions’. In Law J. &
Hassard J. (eds), Actor- Network Theory and After. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Pp.
74-89
Anderson, W. (2002), ‘Postcolonial Technoscience: An Introduction’. Social Studies
of Science, 32 (5-6), 643-658
Anderson, W. (2008), The Collectors of Lost Souls: Turning Kuru Scientists into
Whitemen. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
Anderson, W. (2009), ‘From Subjugated Knowledge to Conjugated Subjects: Science
and Globalisation, or Postcolonial Studies of Science?’, Postcolonial Studies, 12 (4),
389-400
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•
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Santos, B. (2009) ‘A Non-Occidentalist West? Learned Ignorance and the Ecology of
Knowledge’, Theory, Culture & Society, 26, 103-125
Savrasnky, M. (2012), ‘Worlds in the Making: Social Sciences and the Ontopolitics of
Knowledge’. Postcolonial Studies, 15, 351-368
Steven Shapin (1998) ‘Placing the View from Nowhere: Historical and Sociological
Problems in the Location of Science’, Transactions of the Institute of British
Geographers 23 (1), 5–12
Santos, B. (2014), Epistemologies of the South: Justice Against Epistemicide.
Paradigm Publishers.
Harding, S. (2008), Sciences from Below: Feminisms, Postcolonialisms and
Modernities. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Nandy, A. (1988), Science, Hegemony and Violence: A Requiem for Modernity. New
Dehli: Oxford University Press.
Week 5: Boundaries of Science
Much of the sociology of science has been concerned with the demarcation problem; in
particular, in offering an alternative to the essentialist, epistemological approach of
philosophy of science. One of the most successful sociological approaches to demarcation
is Thomas Gieryn’s idea of ‘boundary work’, which illuminates the social processes by which
communities generate ‘science’ and ‘non-science’. This session explores Gieryn’s work and
its application in social studies of science.
Textbook reading
•
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SY – Chapters 1 and 2
MB – Chapter 3
Essential Reading
•
•
Gieryn TF (1983), “Boundary Work and the Demarcation of Science from NonScience: Strains and Interests in the Professional Ideologies of Scientists”, American
Sociological Review Vol.48 pp781-795 [TC 3315].
Amsterdamska, O (2005), ‘Demarcating Epidemiology’, Science, Technology &
Human Values Vol.30(1): 17-51. (Historical case study of disciplinary boundary
setting)
Recommended Readings:
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Gieryn T (1995), ‘Boundaries of Science’ in Jasanoff S et al (eds) Handbook of
Science and Technology Studies, (London: Sage) pp393-443 (Long but useful
overview of the practical problem of demarcating the inside from the outside of
science)
Lynch, M (2004), ‘Circumscribing Expertise: Membership Categories in Courtroom
Testimony’ in Jasanoff, S (ed) States of Knowledge (London: Routledge) – (contains
some criticisms of ‘boundary-work’)
Gieryn, T (1999), Cultural Boundaries of Science: Credibility on the Line (Chicago)
(Esp. Introduction)
Yearley S (1988), Science, Technology and Social Change (London: Unwin Hyman).
Chapter 2.
Jasanoff, S (1987), ‘Contested Boundaries in Policy-Relevant Science’, Social
Studies of Science Vol.17 pp195-230 (On the shifting and negotiable boundary
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•
•
between science and politics)
Golinski, J (1998), Making Natural Knowledge: Constructivism and the History of
Science (Chapter 2 - on historical uses of the boundary problem).
Bal, R (2005), ‘How to Kill with a Ballpoint: Credibility in Dutch Forensic Science’,
Science, Technology & Human Values Vol.30(1): 52-75. (Case study of boundaries
in law)
Week 6 NO CLASS – UCL READING WEEK
Week 7 Actor-Network Theory
One of the most influential – and controversial - schools of thought since the 1980s and
1990s is ‘actor-network theory’. Its central idea is that ‘facts’ are created when
‘heterogeneous’ assemblages of actors and objects are mobilized into a ‘network’. Science
and society are both co-created as the laboratory is used as a focal point for assembling
knowledge and redefining social interests. Science becomes ‘politics by other means’.
Textbook Reading
Either
•
•
SY – Chapter 4 OR
SS – Chapter 8
Essential Readings:
•
•
Latour, B (1999), Pandora’s Hope: Essays on the Reality of Science Studies
(Chapter 2) (A good, relatively clear, illustrative case study of Amazonian soil
science in the making) [Digitally available see p1]
Amsterdamska, O (1990), ‘Surely you are joking, Monseiur Latour!’, Science,
Technology and Human Values Vol.15, Fall, pp495-504.
Recommended Readings
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•
Latour, B (1983), ‘Give Me a Laboratory and I will Raise the World’, in Science
Observed: Perspectives on the Social Study of Science (London: Sage) pp141-170.
or extract in Biaglio, M (1999), The Science Studies Reader (Ch.18)). (Seminal and
much-cited early case study that employs ideas from ANT) [Digitally available see
p1] [See also Jones, S. 2010. Death in a Small Package: A Short History of Anthrax.
Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. For broader context on the Pasteur
case discussed by Latour]
Latour, B (1987), Science in Action (Harvard University Press) (especially
introduction and chapters 1 & 2) (A classic overview of Latour’s ideas) [Ch 2
Digitally available see p1]
Callon, M (1986), ‘Some Elements of a Sociology of Translation: Domestication of
the Scallops and the Fishermen of St Brieuc Bay’, in Biaglio, M (1999), The Science
Studies Reader (London Routledge) (Ch.5) (Some key ANT jargon explained through
a case study of molluscs in Brittany)
Collins, HM and Yearley, S (1992), ‘Epistemological Chicken’ in A. Pickering (ed)
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Science as Practice and Culture (Chicago: University of Chicago Press) pp301-26
(attacks the notion that non-humans can be treated as if they were the same as
intentional actors)
Callon M and Latour B (1992), “Don’t Throw the Baby Out with the Bath School! A
Reply to Collins and Yearley” in Science as Practice and Culture (Ed. Pickering A.
Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press) pp343-368.
David Bloor, “Anti-Latour,” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 30 (8)
(1999): 81-112.
Bruno Latour, “For David Bloor and Beyond… A Reply to David Bloor’s ‘Anti-Latour’”
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 30 (1) (1999), 113-129, followed by
Bloor’s “Reply to Bruno Latour,” 113-36.
Scott, P (1991), ‘Levers and Counterweights: A Laboratory that Failed to Raise the
World’, Social Studies of Science Vol.21 pp7-37 (empirically based critique of Latour)
Law, J and Hassard, J (1999), Actor-Network Theory and After (Oxford: Blackwell).
Gad, C and Jensen, CB (2010), ‘On the Consequences of Post-ANT’, Science,
Technology and Human Values 35(1): 55-80
Week 8 The Mangle of Practice: Agency and Ontology in Scientific Practice
With ANT and other contemporary approaches to the sociology of science, there is a
growing interest in questions of agency, practices, and on what the sciences ‘make’ and ‘do’
rather than ‘represent’, that is, on questions of ontology. In this session we will explore the
work of other major contributions to the sociology of science that have developed an
approach that is similar yet not equivalent to ANT.
Essential Readings:
•
•
Pickering, A. (1992), The Mangle of Practice: Time, Agency & Science. Chicago and
London: University of Chicago Press. Chapter 1.
Mol, A. (2002), The Body Multiple: Ontology in Medical Practice. Durham & London:
Duke University Press. Chapter 2.
Recommended Readings:
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Pickering, A. (2011), The Cybernetic Brain. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Pickering, A. (1986), Constructing Quarks: A Sociological History of Particle Physics.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Pickering, A. & Guzik, K. (2009), The Mangle in Practice: Science, Society and
Becoming. Durham & London: Duke University Press.
Schatzki, T., Knorr-Cetina, K. & Savigny, E. (2000), The Practice Turn in
Contemporary Theory. London & New York: Routledge
Berg, M. & Mol, A. (1998), Differences in Medicine: Unravelling Practices,
Techniques and Bodies. Durham & London: Duke University Press.
Lampland, M. & Star, S. L. (2008), Standards and their Stories: How Quantifying,
Classifying, and Formalizing Practices Shape Everyday Life. Ithaca: Cornell
University Press.
Law, J. & Mol, A. (2002), Complexities: Social Studies of Scientific Knowledge
Practices. Durham & London: Duke University Press.
Mol, A. (2008), The Logic of Care: Health and the Problem of Patient Choice.London:
Routledge
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Week 9: After ANT: Relationality, Constraints, and Care
Since around 1999 (marked by the publication of the book ‘Actor-Network Thoery and After’)
many developments in the sociology of science and technology have taken ANT as a point
of departure while taking it beyond its initial scope and reworking some of its assumptions. In
this session we will consider some of these new developments and the novel concepts they
have proposed in order to develop a different sociology of science after ANT.
Essential Readings
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•
Despret, V. (2004), ‘The Body We Care For: Figures of Anthropo-zoo-genesis’. Body
& Society, 10 (2-3), 111-134
Puig de la Bellacasa, M. (2011), ‘Matters of Care in Technoscience: Assembling
Neglected Things’. Social Studies of Science, 41, 85-106
Recommended Readings:
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Barad, K. (2007), Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the
Entanglement of Matter and Meaning. Durham & London: Duke University Press.
Jensen, C. P. & Rödje, K. (2010), Deleuzian Intersections: Science, Technology,
Anthropology. New York & Oxford: Berghahn Books.
Gad, C. & Jensen, C. P (2009), ‘On the Consequences of Post-ANT’. Science,
Technology and Human Values, 35, 1, 55-80
Coole, D. & Frost, S. (2010), New Materialisms: Ontology, Agency and Politics.
Durham & London: Duke University Press.
Gomart, E. (2002), ‘Towards Generous Constraint: freedom and coercion in a French
addiction treatment’. Sociology of Health and Illness, 24, 5, 517-549
Delanda, M. (2002), Intensive Science and Virtual Philosophy. London: Continuum.
Haraway, D. (2008), When Species Meet. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota
Press.
Law, J. (2004), After Method: Mess In Social Science Research. London & New
York: Routledge.
Law, J. & Hassard, J. (1999), Actor-Network Theory and After. Oxford: Blackwell.
Mol, A. (2002), The Body Multiple. Durham & London: Duke University Press.
Michael, M. (2012), ‘What are we busy doing? Engaging the Idiot’, Science,
Technology and Human Values, 37, 5, 528-554
Michael, M. & Rosengarten ,M. (2013), Innovation and Biomedicine: Ethics, Evidence
and Expectation in HIV. London: Palgrave.
Gomart, E. (2004), ‘Surprised by Methadone: In praise of Drug substitution
Treatment in a French Clinic’, Body & Society, 10, 85-110
Week 9: The Making of Scientific Selves: History, Epistemology, Subjectivity
Recently there has been a renewed interest in the question of the ‘scientific ethos’ and the
ways in which scientific practices and concepts contribute to cultivating certain forms of
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scientists, or what we will call ‘scientific selves’. How do certain scientific practices shape not
only the objects they address but also the subjects that are involved in them? While there
are connections to the work of Merton, this revitalisation has drawn on the work of other
historical sociologists and philosophers, particularly Michel Foucault, Norbert Elias, and
Marcel Mauss.
Essential Readings
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Daston, L. & Galison, P. (2010), Objectivity. Brooklyn: Zone Books. Ch. 4
Foucault, M. (1997), ‘Technologies of the Self’. In Rabinow, P. (ed), Ethics,
Subjectivity and Truth: The Essential Works of Michel Foucault 1954-1984, vol. 1.
London: Penguin.
Recommended Readings
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Hacking, I. (1986), ‘Making Up People’. In T. Heller et al. (eds), Reconstructing
Individualism. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Browne, J. (2003), ‘Charles Darwin as a Celebrity’. Science in Context, 16, 175-194
Daston, L. & Sibum, P. (2003), ‘Introduction: Scientific Personae and their Histories’,
Science in Context, 16, 1-8
Daston, L. & Lunbeck, E. (2003), Histories of Scientific Observation. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Elias, N. (2000), The Civilizing Process. Oxford: Willey-Blackwell
Holden, K. (2014), ‘Lamenting the Golden Age: Love, Labour and Loss in the
Collective Memory of Scientists’, Science as Culture, forthcoming.
Rose, N. (1998), Inventing Our Selves: Psychlogy, Power, and Personhood. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press
Savransky, M. (2014), ‘Of Recalcitrant Subjects’. Culture, Theory & Critique, 55 (1), 96113
Shapin, S. (1991). “‘A Scholar and a Gentleman’: The Problematic Identity of the
Scientific Practitioner in Early Modern England.” History of Science 29:279–327.
Shapin, S (2008), The Scientific Life: A Moral History of a Late Modern Vocation
(University of Chicago Press)
Shortland, M. and R. Yeo, eds. (1996). Telling Lives in Science: Essays on Scientific
Biography. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press.
Taylor, C. (1989). Sources of the Self: The Making of Modern Identity. Cambridge,
Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Week 11 Beyond War, Peace: Science in an Ecology of Practices
The course finishes with an introduction to the work of one of the most innovative recent
thinkers in science studies, namely, Isabelle Stengers. We will explore several aspects of
her work and the distinct way in which she challenges both scientists and what she calls ‘the
interpreters of science’. We will consider how the sociologist, or the social thinker of science
more generally, might contribute to a productive dialogue across practices instead of fuelling
the so-called ‘science wars’.
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2013-14 syllabus
Essential Readings
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Stengers, I. (2011), ‘Wondering About Materialism’. In Bryant, L. et al. (Eds.), The
Speculative Turn. Melbourne: re.press. Chapter 22.
Recommended Readings
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Stengers, I (2005), ‘Introductory Notes on an Ecology of Practices’. Cultural Studies
Review, 11, 1, 183-196
Haraway, D. (1997), ‘enlightenment@science_wars.come: A Persona Reflection on
Love and War’, Social Text, 50, 123-129
Serres, M. (1995), The Natural Contract. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
Latour, B. (2002), War of Worlds: What about Peace?. Chicago: Prickly Paradigm
Press.
Stengers, I. (2005), ‘The Cosmopolitical Proposal’. In Latour, B. & P. Weibel (eds),
Making Things Public. Cambridge, MA & London: MIT Press.
Stengers, I. (2010), Cosmopolitcs I. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Stengers, I. (2011), Comsopolitics II. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
Stengers, I. (2011), ‘Wondering about Materialism’. In Bryant et al. (eds), The
Speculative Turn. Melbourne: Re.press.
Whitehead, A. N. (1967), Adventures of Ideas. New York: Free press.
Watson, M. (2013), ‘Derrida, Stengers, Latour, and Subalternist Cosmopolitics’.
Theory Culture and Society, 31, 75-98
Assessment
summary
Description
Deadline
Word limit
Focused Review
11 Nov
1000 words
Essay
16 Dec
4000 words
coursework
Assignment 1: Focussed Review By this stage of the MSc course you should be able to read, understand and start to provide your own evaluation of research articles that draw on the main approaches to sociology of science covered in this course. Select one research article from either Social Studies of Science or Science, Technology & Human Values or Science as Culture journals, written since January 2012. You may choose other journals that publish research drawing on sociology of science but should confirm this with me first (eg Biosocieties, Public Understanding of Science). The article should relate to one or more themes or topics from the course (e.g. it uses actor-­‐network theory, it employs ethnographic methods, it adopts a postcolonial 14
HPSC0000 Title
2013-14 syllabus
perspective, etc). You must make this a different topic to your essay two topic (you are permitted some overlap, but it should mainly link to a different topic). Write a 1000 word critical review of the article. •
The review should have a title of your choosing, and you should also clearly state which article you are reviewing. [don’t add this to the word count] •
The review must explain (even if only in a sentence or two) how the article relates to the course. You should also read at least 3-­‐4 pieces from the most relevant topic on the reading list as contextual material. •
The review should describe and explain the main argument(s) presented in the article. Your review should also leave space for critical discussion of the material presented in the piece (e.g. strengths, weaknesses, comparison with other literature on the topic, or with other approaches on the course, does it really achieve what it claims to have done?). Hint: It helps here to have one main message that runs through your review. •
You should cite other work from the reading list (or beyond) in your review but are expected to mainly focus on your chosen article. Perhaps 2-­‐3 contextual citations would be a very rough guideline [don’t add your bibliography to the word count] You might want to skim through an example of one article (and its critical response in Social Studies of Science: Jorges, B (1999) ‘Do Politics Have Artefacts?’, Social Studies of Science 29(3): 411-­‐32 Woolgar, S and Cooper, G (1999) ‘Do Artefacts Have Ambivalence: Moses’ Bridges, Winners’ Bridges and Other Urban Legends’, Social Studies of Science 29(3): 433-­‐449 If you need reminding of the original debate see section entitled ‘technical arrangements and social order’ in: Winner, L (1999), ‘Do Artefacts Have Politics?’, in MacKenzie D and Wajcman J (Eds), The Social Shaping of Technology (Milton Keynes: Open University Press) pp28-­‐39 (Also in 1st edition). (Also widely available on-­‐line, eg http://zaphod.mindlab.umd.edu/docSeminar/pdfs/Winner.pdf) Assignment 2
Indicative Essay Questions (4000 words)
You can use these questions or devise your own question. I am happy to discuss this
question during my office hours but as rough guidance any well-phrased essay question will
have both a descriptive (what do you know) and evaluative (what do think about the topic)
element to it.
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HPSC0000 Title
2013-14 syllabus
1. Does the strong programme have any strengths?
2. Ethnographers of science have claimed that their fieldwork demonstrates that
‘nothing epistemologically special’ happens in laboratories. Critically evaluate this
claim.
3. Feminist approaches to gender and science have demonstrated modern scientific
knowledge tends to embody masculine presuppositions. What, if any alternatives
have feminist approaches propose or could they propose to our understanding of
science?
4. Despite claims to the contrary, Actor-Network Theory cannot be reduced to social
constructivism. Discuss.
5. According to sociologists of science, what is at stake when scientists contest or
defend the boundaries of science? How convincing are these sociologists’
arguments?
6. What, if anything, does ‘co-production’ AND/OR ‘framing’ add to our understanding of
controversies involving science and technology?
7. Even if Science is a Western, modern, enterprise, is scientific knowledge not
‘universal’?. Discuss
8. What, if anything, does an attention to ‘scientific selves’ add to our understanding of
scientific practices and knowledge?
9. What are the main differences between some post-ANT developments (pick one) and
ANT’s classical tenets, and how might these new developments contribute to a
more/less productive sociology of science?
10. What, if any, would be the implication of Stengers’s insistence on the role of
‘wonder’ for sociology of science? Discuss.
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