On Actor-Network Theory. A Few Clarifications, Plus More Than a Few Complications
TL;DR: In this article, the authors explore the consequences of this peculiar situation which has not been underlined before science studies forced us to retie the links between these three resources, i.e., naturality, sociality and social fabric.
Abstract: Three resources have been developped over the ages to deal with agencies. The first one is to attribute to them naturality and to link them with nature. The second one is to grant them sociality and to tie them with the social fabric. The third one is to consider them as a semiotic construction and to relate agency with the building of meaning. The originality of science studies comes from the impossibility of clearly differentiating those three resources. Microbes, neutrinos of DNA are at the same time natural, social and discourse. They are real, human and semiotic entities in the same breath. The article explores the consequence of this peculiar situation which has not been underlined before science studies forced us to retie the links between these three resources. The actornetwork theory developped by Callon and his colleagues is an attempt to invent a vocabulary to deal with this new situation. The article reviews those difficulties and tries ot overcome them by showing how they may be used to account for the consturction of entities, that is for the attribution of nature, society and meaning.
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TL;DR: In this paper, a meta-institutional agenda for critical carceral geography is derived, and possible ways to short-circuit carceral systems are revealed, revealing that prisons and other carceral spaces are traversed by various circulations that reach within and beyond their boundaries.
Abstract: Despite the popular impression of prisons and other carceral spaces as disconnected from broader social systems, they are traversed by various circulations that reach within and beyond their boundaries. This article opens a new analytical window onto this reality, developing the concept of ‘circuits’ to critically enquire into the carceral. Drawing inspiration from Harvey (1982; 1985), the article makes circuits do fresh work, teasing apart the emerging carceral landscape to provide a new critical epistemology for carceral geographies. In so doing, a meta-institutional agenda for critical carceral geography is derived, and possible ways to short-circuit carceral systems are revealed.
96 citations
Cites methods from "On Actor-Network Theory. A Few Clar..."
...To borrow from actor-network theory, we conceive of the carceral landscape as ‘fibrous, thread-like, wiry, [and] ropy’ (Latour, 1997: 3)....
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28 Mar 2017
TL;DR: Burridge and Gill as mentioned in this paper acknowledge the support of the Economic and Social Research Council, grant number ES/J023426/1 and the Academy of Finland Postdoctoral Research Grant #268596.
Abstract: Andrew Burridge and Nick Gill acknowledge the support of the Economic and Social Research Council, grant number ES/J023426/1. Lauren Martin was supported by Academy of Finland Postdoctoral Research Grant #268596. We thank John Agnew and two reviewers for their constructive comments; any errors remain our own.
89 citations
Cites background from "On Actor-Network Theory. A Few Clar..."
...A ‘fibrous, thread-like, wiry, [and] ropy’ (Latour, 1997, p. 3) social ontology promises to throw into relief the sinewy and cross cutting texture of both borders on the one hand andmigrant routes on the other....
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Dissertation•
01 Jan 2019
80 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that transparency efforts involve much more than the provision of information and other forms of "sunlight" and are rather a matter of managing visibilities than providing insight and clarity.
Abstract: While we witness a growing belief in transparency as an ideal solution to a wide range of societal problems, we know less about the practical workings of transparency as it guides conduct in organizational and regulatory settings. This article argues that transparency efforts involve much more than the provision of information and other forms of ‘sunlight’, and are rather a matter of managing visibilities than providing insight and clarity. Building on actor-network theory and Foucauldian governmentality studies, it calls for careful attention to the ways in which transparency ideals are translated into more situated practices and become associated with specific organizational and regulatory concerns. The article conceptualizes transparency as a force that shapes conduct in organizational and socio-political domains. In the second section, this conceptualization of transparency as a form of ‘ordering’ is substantiated further by using illustrations of the effects of transparency efforts in the internet do...
70 citations
TL;DR: The purpose of this conceptual paper is to explore and map the “espoused theories” of agency used in educational contexts, with a focus on the normative view of student agency assumed within dominant school practices, desired by educational practitioners, leaving out non-normative emerging agencies such as student agency of resistance.
Abstract: The purpose of this conceptual paper is to explore and map the "espoused theories" (Argyris and Schon 1978) of agency used in educational contexts. More precisely, we limit the focus on the normative view of student agency assumed within dominant school practices, desired by educational practitioners, leaving out non-normative emerging agencies such as student agency of resistance. Agency is a "tricky" concept, and often scholars who use the concept of agency do not define or operationalize it (e.g., Archer 2000). One reason is that there is no consensus among scholars about the notion of agency, especially when applied to educational contexts (Hitlin and Elder Sociological Theory, 25 (2), 170-191, 2007). Moreover, the recent neoliberal framing of individuals' agency as fully autonomous, flexible, and self-entrepreneur is adding the dilemma of agency manipulation in the sphere of education (Gershon 2011; Sidorkin 2004). To tackle this dilemma in educational contexts, we suggest to further interrogating the normative notion of agency in all its modes and develop a more nuanced conceptualization. We hope that such conceptualization would produce an understanding of the diverse manifestations and definitions of agency within a human ideal, educational content, behaviors, and social settings. We observed diverse uses of the normative term "agency" in educational discourse. We examined the term as used by researchers and practitioners. We also looked at the different ways it has been used in philosophical discussions of education, political framing of the civic role of schooling, disciplinary policy statements, school mission statements, and in everyday common use. It is worthy to note that our categorization of the use and meaning of the normative term "agency" depends on the scholars' epistemological paradigmatic assumptions, socio-political and historical situatedness, and ontological projects being translated into diverse scholarships of education. As a result of our research, we suggest four major normative conceptual frameworks related to agency mainly being adopted in educational contexts that we labeled as: 1) instrumental, 2) effortful, 3) dynamically emergent, and 4) authorial. In this paper, we discuss these normative approaches to agency as we compare and contrast the assumptions and their consequences for the current field of education, mostly from a point of view of authorial definition of agency (our bias).
64 citations
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1,371 citations
Book•
01 Jan 1985
557 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a semi-popular text written by Einstein to present his theory of relativity is explored in some detail, and a comparison between the notion of social context and that of the aether is established to lead us beyond ''social' explanations.
Abstract: This paper explores in some detail a semi-popular text written by Einstein to present his theory of relativity. Semiotic tools are used to compare what Einstein says about the activity of building spaces and times with what sociologists of science can tell us. Einstein's text is read as a contribution to the sociology of delegation. Once the drama of Einstein's argument has been reconstructed, it is possible to learn from his theory of relativity something about the classical problem of `relativity' in the STS field. A comparison is established between the notion of social context and that of the aether, and an argument is developed to lead us beyond `social' explanations. The goal of such a semiotic study is twofold: to allow the adaptation of the strong programme to the peculiar conditions of the theoretical sciences; and to find a vocabulary for an activity best defined as infra-physics.
134 citations
"On Actor-Network Theory. A Few Clar..." refers background in this paper
...Bruno Latour (1988), “A Relativist Account of Einstein's Relativity”, Social Studies of Science, vol. 18, p. 3-44....
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