Professor Vertesi specializes in the sociology of science, knowledge, and technology. Her primary research site is with NASA’s robotic spacecraft teams as an ethnographer. Her books, Seeing like a Rover: Images and Interaction on the Mars Exploration Rover Mission (Chicago, 2015) and Shaping Science: Organizations, Decisions, and Culture on NASA’s Teams (Chicago, 2020) draws on her ethnographic studies of missions to Mars, Saturn, and the … Continue reading Q&A with Janet Vertesi, Author of Shaping Science: Organizations, Decisions, and Culture on NASA’s Teams

Kathleen C. Oberlin is a researcher based in Chicago. Formerly, she was Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology at Grinnell College. In Creating the Creation Museum, Kathleen C. Oberlin shows us how the largest Creationist organization, Answers in Genesis (AiG), built a museum—which has had over three million visitors—to make its movement mainstream. She takes us behind the scenes, vividly bringing the museum to … Continue reading Q&A with Kathleen (Casey) Oberlin, Author of Creating the Creation Museum: How Fundamentalist Beliefs Come to Life

At the August 2020 Business/Council meeting, the Science, Knowledge and Technology (SKAT) section of American Sociological Association decided to form an ad-hoc committee to explore how our scholarly community might support anti-racist action. The committee has been meeting regularly and consulted both with current SKAT Council members and past SKAT chairs to develop a proposal for TWO new awards that together will recognize the work … Continue reading Call for Nominations for Two New Awards Established in the Spirit of Anti-racism

Owen Whooley is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of New Mexico. His research uses historical and qualitative research methods to explore questions related to medical knowledge and professional power. Interview by Timothy O’Brien Q. The subtitle of the book is the “politics of not knowing.” What do you mean by the “politics of not knowing” and how might sociologists benefit from closer attention to … Continue reading Q&A with Owen Whooley, 2020 Merton Book Award Winner

SKAT Open Panel Session Organizer:  John Parker Discussant:  Martine Lappe Panelists: Discourses and Practices of Race, Ethnicity, Ancestry, and Genomics in Hawaii Joan H. Fujimura and Ramya M. Rajagopalan Feminist, Generative Sociotechical Dissent: Seed Politics in Colombia Kelly Moore & Nathalia Hernandez Vidal Uncertainty and the Inconvenient Facts of Diagnosis Annemarie Jutel Discussant Remarks Martine Lappé Assistant Professor of Sociology and Science, Technology and Society Cal … Continue reading SKAT @ ASA 2020 – Recap

III.  Pandemic in an Anti-Science Era:  Reflections from and for STS The Trump presidency and its relationship to science and truth have prompted both reflection and action by STS scholars, including contributors to a recent thematic collection published in early 2020 in Engaging Science, Technology, and Society.  For this newsletter, we requested that the contributors to that collection re-visit the arguments made there in a … Continue reading Anti-Science Nationalism and the Critical Role of STS

III.  Pandemic in an Anti-Science Era:  Reflections from and for STS The Trump presidency and its relationship to science and truth have prompted both reflection and action by STS scholars, including contributors to a recent thematic collection published in early 2020 in Engaging Science, Technology, and Society.  For this newsletter, we requested that the contributors to that collection re-visit the arguments made there in a … Continue reading Viral Geography and Political Calculus