SISP 215/SOC 220: Metabolism and Technoscience
Spring 2016
Tuesdays & Thursdays 1:10-2:30pm
FISK 302
Instructor:
Office:
Office Hours:
Email:
Phone:
Professor Anthony (Tony) Hatch
214 Allbritton (up the “Veranda”)
Thursdays 3:00-4:30pm and by appointment
ahatch@wesleyan.edu
860-685-3991
COURSE DESCRIPTION
This course will investigate the scientific idea of metabolism through the lens of technoscience.
Metabolism is a flexible and mobile scientific idea, one that has been applied at the micro-level of
analysis within biological organisms, the meso-level of social collectivities, and at the macro-level of
global ecologies. Metabolism encompasses all of the biological and technosocial processes through
which bodies (both human and not human) and societies (again, human and not) create and use
nutrients, medicines, toxins, and fuels. The lens of technoscience enables us to investigate the
technological and scientific practices that define and drive metabolic processes within sciences,
cultures, and political economies. These processes implicate forces of production, consumption,
labor, absorption, medicalization, appropriation, expansion, growth, surveillance, regulation, and
enumeration. Accordingly, as we will learn, metabolism is also a profoundly political process that is
inextricably linked to systems that create structural and symbolic violence as well as modes of
resistance and struggle. In these contexts, we will interpret the some of the most pressing metabolic
crises facing human societies including ecological disaster, industrial food regimes, metabolic health
problems, and industrial-scale pollution.
COURSE OBJECTIVES



Comprehend core ideas within technoscience studies
Apply ideas from technoscience studies to metabolic crises
Evaluate the social, scientific, and ethical dimensions of metabolic crises
COURSE READINGS
A large number of readings are free to read online through Wesleyan’s online library. For your
convenience, I have created a course pack/reader for you that contains all of the course readings, in
addition to our two (2) required books:
(1) John Bellamy Foster, Brett Clark, and Richard York. 2010. The Ecological Rift: Capitalism’s
War on the Earth. New York: Monthly Review Press.
(2) Rachel Carson. 2012 [1962]. Silent Spring. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company.
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COURSE REQUIREMENTS AND GRADING
This course uses both a lecture and a student directed format where we learn from and teach each
other. You will be evaluated in part on your contributions to making the class successful for yourself
and others. This is a reading and writing intensive course where you will have to read and write
about a large quantity of material in a relatively short period of time. This is also a course that values
you as a person and respects your experience; share your brilliance and experience with everyone
else! Based on these emphases, your grade is calculated out of 500 points distributed across four
elements:
Class Participation
Reading Quizzes
Reflection Papers
Final Research Paper
10 percent
20 percent
30 percent
40 percent
50 points
100 points
150 points
200 points
Class Participation (10 percent of your grade @ 50 pts)
I expect you to attend every class, on time, prepared to engage fully in your own education. This is a
dialogic course where we will engage in substantive open group discussion with daily prompting and
questioning from me. I expect for you to be an active participant in every moment of every class. It’s
your education. Be present for others. Be mindful of the collective space we share. I will evaluate
your participation according to the following criteria.
Exemplary = up to 50 points. This means you have attended every class possible (with
reasonable exceptions for illness, athletics, verifiable emergencies, etc.), openly demonstrate
outstanding preparedness for each class, and make significant contributions to our collective
learning.
Good = up to 40 points. This means you have attended most classes, demonstrate consistent
preparation for each class, and make substantive contributions to our collective leaning.
Fair = up to 30 points. This means you have missed about 3-4 classes, are generally prepared for
each class, and make marginal contributions to our collective learning.
Poor = up to 20 points. This means you are chronically late and/or absent from class, are rarely
prepared for each class, and either make minimal contributions to our learning or take away
from our learning.
Ten (10) Reading Quizzes (20 percent of your grade @ 100 pts)
In order to succeed in this class, it is essential that you complete the readings for each class as
indicated on the course calendar and come to class prepared to discuss what you read. Ten (10)
quizzes (10 points each) will count toward your final grade. However, we will take more than ten
quizzes—I will include your ten best scores. The quizzes are based on the readings that are due that
day as indicated on the course calendar. Quizzes will consist of multiple choice, fill-in-the-blank
questions, true/false, and/or short answer questions. The best way to prepare for these quizzes is to
read/substantively skim everything that is assigned and take reading notes that identify key terms,
shifts, and content in the readings.
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Reflection Papers (30 percent of your grade @ 150 pts)
You will write three (3) reflection papers (50 points per paper; 3-4 pages each) that discuss
synchronies across our course readings, lectures, and discussions within any three out of five major
sections of the course. Reflections are synthetic thought statements written in the first person that signal
your understanding of course content by identifying and critically assessing patterns in the content,
themes, and questions that cut across our course. Your job is to engage directly with information
you found especially compelling, problematic, or inspiring. As you make decisions about what to
reflect on, consider that you will have the option of incorporating selected text from your reflections
into your final research paper. Aside from these considerations, each reflection must do the
following:
a) Substantively interrogate (e.g., raise and answer questions about) multiple course
readings from within that part of the course
b) Connect your interrogation multiple lectures and/or in-class discussions from within that
part of the course
c) Incorporate and examine your own thoughts, interpretations, feelings, beliefs, practices
on the issues raised in the readings, lectures, and discussions.
d) Be no less than three (3) and no more than four (4) full pages in length.
Each paper needs to be double-spaced, with 1-inch margins, and 12-point font with your name,
course name, response number, and the date typed single-spaced at the top of the page. I will deduct
five (5) points automatically for improperly formatted papers. Please include footnotes with
complete citations when appropriate.
Reflection Paper Due Dates: You will select any three major parts of the course (I through V) and
turn in a reflection paper about each part of the course on the first day of the next part. For
example, a reflection paper based on Part I of the course is due on Tuesday, February 2. Reflection
papers written about part V of the course are due on the last day of classes (with no exceptions).
Please print out and turn in your response papers at the beginning of the class. Unexcused late
reflection papers will lose five (5) points per day of lateness (starting the day of class they were due).
Final Research Paper (40 percent of your grade @ 200 points)
You will write one ten (10) page research paper that uses an analytic framework of technoscience to
investigate a specific social, cultural, or scientific problem related to metabolism. We will discuss the
instructions for the final research paper assignment later in the course. I strongly encourage you to
make regular use of my office hours to discuss this assignment. I will make myself available during
the reading period for extra help with your papers.
Proposal Due Date: A one (1) page proposal for the paper is due on Tuesday, April 12 that informs
me of your provisional thinking. Upload your completed proposal to Moodle before class. This
proposal is worth 25 points out of 200 for the final research paper. I prefer clearly articulated and
well conceived proposals to thin and muddled proposals.
Paper Due Date: 5:00pm on Wednesday, May 11th in Moodle.
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GRADING SCALE
Percent
97-100
93-96
90-92
87-89
83-86
80-82
77-79
73-76
70-72
67-69
63-66
60-63
57-59
53-56
50-52
47-49
44-46
40-43
below 40
Points
485-500
465-484
450-464
435-449
415-434
400-414
385-399
365-384
350-364
335-349
315-334
300-314
285-299
265-284
250-264
235-249
220-234
200-219
below 200
Grade
A+
A
AB+
B
BC+
C
CD+
D
DF+
F
FE+
E
EF
OTHER VERY IMPORTANT COURSE INFORMATION
This course requires a high level of student preparedness and endurance. I do not expect this to be
an easy course, but I do expect it to be an engaging, enriching, and empowering one. Please review
the following information, as it is essential to your success. You are responsible for all of the
information that follows—please consult the syllabus before you email me with questions about
course policies.
DISCLAIMER
This syllabus provides a general plan for the course: deviations may be necessary.
HOW TO CONTACT ME
Please email me with any questions or concerns about the class, but please note that I only read and
respond to student emails during normal business hours (9-5, M-F) except in rare cases of actual
emergency. Please allow 1-2 days for an email response from me for non-urgent issues. Be sure to
review the syllabus carefully before emailing me about course policies.
I would also love to see you during my office hours on Thursdays 3:00-4:30pm and by appointment.
Please have respect for the fact that I’m a writer and work in my office everyday. If you come to my
office unannounced, I will politely ask you to come on Thursday or to email me for an appointment.
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EXTRA CREDIT
I reserve the right to offer extra credit during the semester at my discretion. I also reserve the right
not to offer extra credit.
LATE WORK
WE TAKE QUIZZES WITHIN THE FIRST 10-15 MINUTES OF CLASS—YOU WILL NOT
BE ABLE TO MAKE UP QUIZZES IF YOU ARE LATE! READ THAT AGAIN.
If you have an excused absence from class when we take a quiz, you can make up your quiz during
my weekly office hours (Thursdays 3-4:30). I will not hunt you down asking you to make up your
work—it is your responsibility to keep me informed about your work.
Unexcused late reflection papers will lose five (5) points per day of lateness (starting the day of class
they were due).
I retain the right to offer and/or deny make-ups based on my assessment of your situation and any
relevant documentation.
USING MOODLE
I will make regular use of Moodle’s “News” feature to communicate with the entire class. It is your
responsibility to monitor Moodle regularly for any important announcements!
TECHNOLOGY USE IN CLASS
You are NOT permitted to use laptops, smart phones, or tablets during class without explicit
permission from me. Explicit permission from me looks like you signing a written pledge to only use
note-taking applications on a laptop or tablet. We are in class for 1 hour and 20 minutes each day—
this is exceptionally valuable time in our lives and I’d rather not waste it with you being in two or
more digital “places” while you are with us. Using devices during class is disruptive to the class and
disrespectful to me personally. Be digitally unavailable to your people during class time (that’s what I
do). Be on notice: I favor public humiliation if you violate this ethic. However, if you must make or
take an EMERGENCY phone call during class, please step outside to do so.
ACADEMIC DISHONESTY IS SERIOUS
I treat all forms of academic honesty with the utmost seriousness and strongly encourage you to
comply with Wesleyan’s Honor Code which you can review within the student handbook
(http://www.wesleyan.edu/studentaffairs/studenthandbook/20152016studenthandbook.pdf)
Violations of the Honor Code may result in an F in the course and possible academic and
disciplinary action. All violations will be reported without exception.
DISABILITY RESOURCES
Wesleyan University is committed to ensuring that all qualified students with disabilities are afforded
an equal opportunity to participate in and benefit from its programs and services. To receive
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accommodations, a student must have a documented disability as defined by Section 504 of the
Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the ADA Amendments Act of 2008, and provide documentation of
the disability. Since accommodations may require early planning and generally are not provided
retroactively, please contact Disability Resources as soon as possible. If you believe that you might
need accommodations for a disability, please contact Dean Patey in Disability Resources, located in
North College, Room 021, or call 860/685-5581 for an appointment to discuss your needs and the
process for requesting accommodations.
COURSE EVALUATION
Your honest and constructive assessment of this course plays an indispensable role in shaping the
future of education at Wesleyan and my prospects for future employment here (for real). Upon
completing this course, please take time to fill out the online course evaluation.
COURSE CALENDAR
1. Thursday, January 21: Introduction and Syllabus
Part I: Theorizing Technoscience
2. Tuesday, January 26: Feminist Technoscience Studies
Donna J. Haraway. 1997. “Syntactics: The Grammar of Feminism and Technoscience,” pp. 1-20 in
Modest_Witness@Second_Millennium.FemaleMan₋Meets₋OncoMouse: Feminism and technoscience. New York:
Routledge.
Sandra J. Harding. 2015. “New Citizens, New Societies: New Sciences, New Philosophies?” pp. 1-25
in Objectivity and Diversity: Another Logic of Scientific Research. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
3. Thursday, January 28: Political Sociology of Science
Scott Frickel and Kelly Moore. 2006. “Prospects and Challenges for a New Political Sociology of
Science,” pp. 3-34 in The New Political Sociology of Science: Institutions, Networks, and Power.
Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
Shelia Jasanoff. 2004. “Ordering Knowledge, Ordering Society,” pp. 13-46 in States of Knowledge: The
Co-Production of Science and the Social Order. New York: Routledge.
Part II: The Ecological Rift
4. Tuesday, February 2: The Ecological Rift
John Bellamy Foster, Brett Clark, and Richard York. 2010. The Ecological Rift: Capitalism’s War on the
Earth. New York: Monthly Review Press. (Wesleyan Online Library), read Part I
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5. Thursday, February 4: The Ecological Rift
The Ecological Rift, read Part II
6. Tuesday, February 9: The Ecological Rift
The Ecological Rift, read Part III
Part III: Food Regimes
7. Thursday, February 11: Food Regimes
Harriet Friedmann. 1993. The political economy of food: A global crisis. New Left Review (197): 2957.
Phillip D. McMichael. 2009. “A food regime genealogy.” Journal of Peasant Studies. 36:139-169.
8. Tuesday, February 16: Food Security
Eric Holt-Giménez. 2001. “Food Security, Food Justice, or Food Sovereignty? Crises, Food
Movements, and Regime Change,” pp. 309-330 in Cultivating Food Justice: Race, Class, and Sustainability
(Edited by Alison Hope Alkron and Julian Agyeman) Cambridge: The MIT Press. (Wesleyan Online
Library)
Kari Marie Norgaard, Ron Reed, and Carolina Van Horn. 2001. “A Continuing Legacy: Institutional
Racism, Hunger, and Nutritional Justice on the Klamath,” pp. 23-46 in Cultivating Food Justice: Race,
Class, and Sustainability (Edited by Alison Hope Alkron and Julian Agyeman) Cambridge: The MIT
Press. (Wesleyan Online Library)
9. Thursday, February 18: Agricultural Labor
Seth Holmes. 2013. “Because They’re Lower to the Ground: Naturalizing Social Suffering,” pp. 155181 in Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies: Migrant Farmworkers in the United States. Berkeley: University of
California Press. (Wesleyan Library Online)
Timothy Pachirat. 2013. “Es todo por hoy,” pp. 85-108 in Every Twelve Seconds: Industrialized Slaughter
and the Politics of Sight. New Haven: Yale University Press. (Wesleyan Library Online)
10. Tuesday, February 23: Food Safety
Marion Nestle (2010). “Peddling Dreams: Promises Versus Realities,” pp. 145-166 in Safe Food: The
Politics of Food Safety. Berkeley: University of California Press. (Wesleyan Library Online)
Bruce M. Chassy. 2015 “Food Safety,” pp. 587-614 in The Oxford Handbook of Food, Politics, and Society
(Edited by Ronald J. Herring). New York: Oxford University Press.
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11. Thursday, February 25: Techno-foods
Anthony Winson. 2013. “The Spatial Colonization of the Industrial Diet: The Supermarket,” pp.
184-205 in The Industrial Diet: The Degradation of Food and the Struggle for Healthy Eating. New York: New
York University Press. (Wesleyan Online Library)
Marion Nestle. 2007. “Beyond Fortification: Making Foods Functional,” pp. 315-337 in Food Politics:
How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health. Berkeley: University of California Press.
12. Tuesday, March 1: Fuels and Climate Change
Phillip D. McMichael. 2010. “Agrofuels in the food regime.” Journal of Peasant Studies 37:609-629.
Derrill D. Watson II. 2015. “Climate Change and Agriculture: Countering Doomsday Scenarios,”
pp. 453-474 in The Oxford Handbook of Food, Politics, and Society (Edited by Ronald J. Herring). New
York: Oxford University Press.
13. Thursday, March 3: Cannibalism
Cormac O. Gráda. 2015. “Eating People is Wrong: Famine’s Other Secret?” pp. 11-37 in Eating
People is Wrong, and Other Essays on Famine, Its Past and Its Future. Princeton: Princeton University
Press. (Wesleyan Library Online)
Vincent Woodward (2014). “Cannibalism in Transatlantic Context,” pp. 29-57 in The Delectable Negro:
Human Consumption and Homoeroticism with US Slave Culture (Edited by Justin A. Joyce and Dwight
McBride). New York: New York University Press. (Wesleyan Library Online)
Spring Break: March 7 - March 18
Part IV: Health Sciences and Medicine
14. Tuesday, March 22: Nutritionism & Nutritionalization
Jane Dixon. 2009. From the imperial to the empty calorie: How nutrition relations underpin food
regime transitions. Agriculture and Human Values 26 (4): 321-33.
Gyorgy Scrinis. 2013. “A Clash of Nutritional Ideologies,” in Nutritionism: The Science and Politics of
Dietary Advice. New York: Columbia University Press. (Wesleyan Library Online)
15. Thursday, March 24: Epigenetics
Hannah Landecker. 2011. Food as exposure: Nutritional epigenetics and the new metabolism.
Biosocieties 6 (2): 167-94.
Hannah Landecker and Aaron Panofsky. 2013. From social structure to gene regulation, and back: A
critical introduction to environmental epigenetics for sociology. Annual Review of Sociology 39: 333-57.
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16. Tuesday, March 29: Sugar
Sidney Mintz. 1986. “Sugar and Morality,” pp. 67-83 in Tasting Food, Tasting Freedom. Boston: Beacon
Press.
Anthony R. Hatch. 2016. “Sugar Stained with Blood: African Americans, Sugar, and Modern
Agriculture,” in Blood Sugar: Racial Pharmacology and Food Justice in Black America. Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota Press.
17. Thursday, March 31: Fatness/Thinness
Charlotte Biltekoff. 2013. “Thinness as Health, Self-Control, and Citizenship,” pp. 109-149 in Eating
Right in America: The Cultural Politics of Food and Health. Duke University Press. (Requested from Conn
College)
Reading TBA
18. Tuesday, April 5: Diabetes
Chris Feudtner. 2015. “Irony in an Era of Medical Marvels: Diabetes History as a Study of Health
and Hope,” pp. 3-32 in Bittersweet: Diabetes, Insulin, and the Transformation of Illness. Chapel Hill:
University of North Carolina Press. (Wesleyan Library Online)
Michael Montoya. 2011. “Genes and Disease on the U.S.-Mexico Border: The Science of State
Formation in Diabetes Research,” pp. 69-90 in Making the Mexican Diabetic: Race, Science, and the
Genetics of Inequality. Berkeley: University of California Press. (Wesleyan Library Online)
19. Thursday, April 7: Organic Alternatives
Wenonah Hauter. 2012. “Organic Food: The Paradox,” pp. 98-116 in Foodopoly: The Battle over the
Future of Food and Farming in America. New York: The New Press.
Tomas Larsson. 2015. “The Rise of Organic Foods Movement as a Transnational Phenomenon,”
pp. 739-754 in The Oxford Handbook of Food, Politics, and Society (Edited by Ronald J. Herring). New
York: Oxford University Press.
20. Tuesday, April 12: Milk
Andrea S. Wiley. 2014. “Milk as Children’s Food: Growth and the Meanings of Milk for Children,”
pp. 113-146 in Cultures of Milk: The Biology and Meaning of Diary Products in the United States and India.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Wenonah Hauter. 2012. “Milking the System,” pp. 211-226 in Foodopoly: The Battle over the Future of
Food and Farming in America. New York: The New Press.
***Proposal for your final research paper is due
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21. Thursday, April 14: Prison Food
Jesse McKinley. “New York Prisons Take an Unsavory Punishment Off the Table,” New York
Times, December 17, 2015.
Reading TBA
Part V: Environmental Toxicology & Industrial Pollution
22. Tuesday, April 19: Silent Spring I
Rachel Carson. 2012/1962. Silent Spring. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, Chapters 1-9
23. Thursday, April 21: Silent Spring II
Rachel Carson. 2012/1962. Silent Spring. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, Chapters 10-17
24. Tuesday, April 26: Pesticides
Jill Harrison. 2011. “Assessing the Scope and Severity of Pesticide Drift,” 25-50 in Pesticide Drift and
the Pursuit of Environmental Justice. Cambridge: The MIT Press. (Wesleyan Library Online)
25. Thursday, April 28: Complexities of Toxicology
Michelle Murphy. 2006. “Indoor Pollution at the Encounter of Toxicology and Popular
Epidemiology,” pp. 81-110 in Sick Building Syndrome and the Problem of Uncertainty: Environmental Politics,
Technoscience, and Women Workers. Durham: Duke University Press.
Sara Shostak. 2013. “Toxicology is a Political Science,” pp. 23-47 in Exposed Science: Genes, the
Environment, and the Politics of Population Health. Berkeley: University of California Press. (Wesleyan
Library Online)
26. Tuesday, May 3: Last Day of Class
Wednesday, May 11 @ 5pm Final Research Papers Due in Moodle.
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