Download Human Agency as Primary (Social Construction of Technology, user-)

Lit Review Memo Example: (please do not publish in any way without author’s permission,
[email protected]), 8/25/2016. For educational purposes only.
Tech and Society Memo
In order from human agency to tech agency, how does each author describe or understand the
relationship between humans and technology? Who has the power in these relationships? What does
each theory stress (politics, economics, psychology etc)? What are advantages and disadvantages of
each theory?
Human Agency as Primary (Social Construction of Technology, user-)
TRANSLATION AND BOUNDARY OBJECTS
Star and Griesemer, 1989: boundary objects are objects that intersect multiple social worlds (393) and
satisfy “informational requirements” of each world (393) weakly structures in common use but strong
structure in individual use, have diff meanings in each world but a small thread of common meaning
across worlds (393) in other words, they are objects that can be interpreted by different social groups
while concurrently connecting these social groups into coherent (although perhaps ideologically thin)
whole.
Uses ex of museums and diff social groups between naturalists, prof. biologists, philanthropists,
conservationaists, university admins, taxidermists, animals of research (395)- types of boundary objs. In
this case are repositories, ideal types, standardized methods (411)
Here objects are not actors or agents, but have meaning impressed upon them by relations of different
social groups. Their meaning is flexible.
SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF TECHNOLOGY (SCOT)
Kline and Pinch, 1996 (766): artifacts have interpretive flexibility (766) : meanings can be embedded in
artifacts or traced throughout their development (766) SCOT developed by Pinch and Bijker in 1980s
(765)
SCOT is different from other soc. Constructionist approaches because it highlights the multiple
interpretations that can occur surrounding an artifact (766). SCOT’s limitations are that it does not look
at social structures or power relationships in which interpretation takes place- no context (767)
Authors use SCOT but deal with weaknesses in looking at how inter. Flex. Can reappear in objevt (the
context of this reappearance), looks at how social relationships are related to shaping of an artifact
(their example is about gender) (767) and how both are shaped by process (768)
Their example is farm gender identities and motor car, where gender not only shapes motor car but are
also shaped by motor car (780)- which appears to give the motor car itself a certain amount of power in
the shaping process. Reinterpretation of car through car dealers etc (788-791)
Lit Review Memo Example: (please do not publish in any way without author’s permission,
[email protected]), 8/25/2016. For educational purposes only.
ACTIVITY THEORY (founded by Leontiv- disciple of Vygotsky): Katelinen and Nardi (read Foot’s work
below)- comes out of sociocultural psychology in Russia in 20s and 30s, therefore has a psychological
edge, basis for interaction where “mental processes are mediated by culturally developed means” (42):
"It was claimed that individuals and their social environments are not separated by an
impenetrable border. Instead, they were to be understood as two poles of a single
individual-collective dimension. Mental processes transform along this dimension of the
dynamics of mental processes over the course of their development." (p. 46)
Kaptelinen and Nardi, 2006, interested in HCI Design- p. 10-11: Tenants (human intentionality,
asymmetry of people and things- do not ascribe artifacts with agency- people act with tech and
construct desires as objects, importance of human development –sociocultural process with interaction
between internalization or human psychological processes and externalization of these processes within
interactions between others and society- idea of culture and society as shaping human activity- shaping
is a back and forth btw human, culture and society)
Of basic principles of activity: #6 mediation has two roles- “tools shape the way humans interact with
reality” and 2) reflect experiences of others who try to solve similar problems (70) in human-computer
interaction, one needs to consider the computer or technology “as a mediator between human
beings and the world, rather than a pole of interaction” (78)
Agency (p.33): agency defined as ability to produce effects can be ascribed to both subject and object of
activity- interactive and has mutual effects. Agency of subject of activity is defined as ability and need to
act”
CULTURAL-HISTORICAL ACTIVITY THEORY (CHAT)
Foot, 2001: action ethnography to help a virtual community better understand their collaborative work
and to develop a better network (EAWARN) (57)- unit of analysis is EAWARN as activity system (58)
What’s similar to Kaptilenin and Nardi: the activity unit, realized thorugh tool-mediated actions by which
actors collectively engage. (61)acknowledges contradictions, conflict as tools for analysis in which new
opportunities for development are revealed (62-63) what Foot calls “illuminative hinges” where
reflection occurs (psychological component) (63); activities are realized through interlinked toolmediated actions by which actors engage, pursue etc an evolving object” (61)
Both Nardi and Foot follows Ergstrom’s expansion to unit of activity: explicate social structures of
activities- 1)rules regulating actions towards object and relations with other actors, 2) community of
people involved in object, 3)division of labor including horizontal division of tasks and vertical division of
power (61) (N and K, p 73)
What’s different btw Foot and Nardi?Answer, not much: CHAT includes both Activity theory (Leontiev)
and cultural historical psychology (Vygotsky)- cultural historical psychology premise that culture and
society are generative force shaping the nature of the human mind” (50 Nardi), subjective world not
Lit Review Memo Example: (please do not publish in any way without author’s permission,
[email protected]), 8/25/2016. For educational purposes only.
external to objective reality where people are the ones transforming reality into a “meaningful picture”,
but people appropriate meanings and values from social-cultural world. (50, Nardi) People do not just
“see” reality but must be able to “relate” to reality (50, Nardi). Activity Theory is processes of interaction
not just with external world of society and culture, but with a community or collective of individuals that
have object-oriented goals (66), hierarchichal structure of activity, the psychological processes between
individual actors and social-cultural world, their external behavior in world, and btw the learner and
others, mediation of actions using tools, and the need to contextualize development within the social,
cultural, historical context.(66-71, Nardi- basically adopts psychological aspect and places it within
context of human-human, human-object interaction)
Equal Agency
ACTOR NETWORK THEORY (ANT)
Miettinen, 1999: From French philosophy and semiotics, principle of generalized symmetry where same
treatment is given to both humans and “non human elements” in a network (172)- actor networks are
heterogenous (173)culture and production of ANT is parallel to concept of work and object-oriented
activity of AT) (175?)
Concept of mediation: LaTour: mediation is event or process that gives birth to or explains nature or
culture (177)
LaTour, 1991 (Durable article: social relations include non-human actants (103), example of room key
with speakers and listeners (104-105) 9see below for definition of figuration, actant, agency) also in
durable article
Actant is from study of literature- can have different figurations of same actions (from intro ANT book,
54)
Agencies are always in account of doing something (52 intro book), figuration of agency is actant
figuration not just people, can be tech, ideas etc (53)
Objects often left out of role in society by sociologists due to their definition of social, actors and
agencies based on intentionality(71 intro) not normative symmetry between object and people where
both are “equal” to one another (76 intro)
OBJECT CENTERED SOCIALITY IN POSTSOCIAL SOCIETY
Knorr, 1997 (read by Kaptellinen and Nardi): breaks from concept of individualization (often seen by
sociologists in negative terms, (2-3)which ignores human-object relations (which can include
technology) ; says humans relate to objects in a state of objectualization, where objects displace
humans as relationship partners or increasingly mediate human relationships (1)
Lit Review Memo Example: (please do not publish in any way without author’s permission,
[email protected]), 8/25/2016. For educational purposes only.
Objects are not commodities (a part of economic trade where objects hold monetary value) or
instruments (not just things-to-be-used, but things-in-process- development -10). Thus tech can be an
object because in continous source of development, like neff’s Permanently beta.
Psychological approach in relations to objects as “notion of lack” and “corresponding structure of
wanting” (similar to Activity Theory, p12), not through positive feelings. Based on mutuality, or
continuous chain of wanting through signs they give off to subjects(14) and this dynamic empashizes a
chain of reasons rather than isolated reasons 914), look of wanting from person to object and back to
person, object in turn provides for continuation of wanting chain through its lack of completeness (16),
person becomes the object, situated within subject’s internal environment- a part of their psyche (18)
Here objects appear to have agency, or power to act upon the user as the user’s psychological needs act
upon the object in an eternal cycle of needs and wants. While these process appears to begin with the
subject or user, the object becomes a part of the relationship as equal partner.
MUTUAL SHAPING THEORY
Boczkowski, 1999: users and technology mutual shape one another as needs arise. Example of
Argentine mailing list. Adds social psychological component of relationship through focus on banal
nationalism (93), implicit nationalism.
Tech features and relationship to user’s practices and discourses(103)- seems similar to activity theory
except method does not allow for face-to-face observation of activity process, can only see results of
that process and online dialogue of process
Technology Agency Primary (Technological Determinism)
THEORY OF TECHNOLOGICAL POLITICS
Winner, 2003: technology can have politics ("arrangements of power and authority in human
associations as well as the activities that take place within those arrangements." (p. 30)
Politics can be placed upon tech in a socially constructionist way as with the tunnels and bus situation
(30-31) where technical arrangement becomes form of order, or where tech is inherently political, such
as the nuclear power plant (36). Yet politics can be flexible, not inherently “egalitarian”, “democratic”
etc, (33), although certain forms of tech are strongly compatible with certain forms of government” (33)
Both/and position
PROTOLOGICAL CONTROL
Galloway, 2004: demonstrates how control exists in a distributed network and how control is in tension
between distributed and centralized power (DNS). I have put this towards the equal aspect in that
Galloway states that technology has no inherent meaning (53 a circuit not a sentence”)
Lit Review Memo Example: (please do not publish in any way without author’s permission,
[email protected]), 8/25/2016. For educational purposes only.
There are material aspects to technology that inherently determine certain structures (protocols have
certain inherent qualities: robustness, contingency, inter-operability, flexibility, heterogeneity, and
pantheism which operate outside of institutional, government and corporate power (p. 2 of 4
conclusion), different layers of Internet dictate certain aspects of Internet’s structure (41), distributed
networks move away from centralized hierarchical bureaucracies and towards distributed network of
social actors (33), but the very nature of protocols, that which sets the rules of internet’s functions, are
created by human beings through the creation of RFCs (request for comments (38)
NETWORK SOCIETY
Castells, 1996: (329-330)influence of new com, distributed and decentralized, mediated by social
interests , gov policies and bus strategies, a new culture is emerging. Thus (my own voice here), culture
is created primarily through new tech developments that are mediated/regulated through governments,
social interests, and businesses. Strong economic view. Tech has primary agency through and its shape is
transmitted through social/political/economic factors.
Creates a new way of experiencing space and time: space of flows from space of places- has three
layers, the content of space of flows: 1) material support layer (hardware), nodes andhubs, spatial
organization of dominant managerial elites (412); “space is the material support of time-sharing social
practices”(411) (thus when space is rearranged by a tech, time is rearranged and the very characteristics
of our society and our social practices) , thus space of flows is time-shared social practices that “work
through flows” (412)
New media absorbs traditional cultures (370), multimedia “supports social/cultural patterns
characterized by widespread social and cultural differentiation, increasing social stratification and
integration of messages in common cognitive pattern (psychological- tech effects psychological here)
(370-371)
Transforming urban forms into megacities (378) with few urban cores but globally networked (everyone
can be a hub idea) (380)
While technologicall deterministic in attitude, there is some room for other factors such as political,
social and business although these only act as mediators.
MEDIUM THEORY
Diebert, 1997: takes on McLuhan (Medium Theory)and makes it more appropriate- drops elements
heavily criticized but takes core parts of medium theory (2)
Goal to do this is as International relations theorist- to see relationship btw large-scale com changes and
world-order transformation (2). Two elements of interest, structure of political authority(world order)(8)
and communication structures. Authority relates to spatial units of organization and values that
underpin and sustain them (9)
Lit Review Memo Example: (please do not publish in any way without author’s permission,
[email protected]), 8/25/2016. For educational purposes only.
Describes new world order of new tech as “planetary central nervous system” composed of web of webs
(likeCastell’s network of networks(355) and Galloway’s network of networks 38)