Visualizing Devices for Configuring Complex Phenomena in-the-Making

Helena Karasti, Andrea Botero, Joanna Saad-Sulonen, Karen Baker

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

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Abstract

STS scholars are engaging in collaborative research in order to study extended socio-technical phenomena. This article participates in discussions on methodography and inventive methods by reflecting on visualizations used both internally by a team of researchers and together with study participants. We describe how these devices for generating and transforming data were brought to our ethnographic inquiry into the formation of research infrastructures which we found to involve unwieldy and evolving phenomena. The visualizations are partial renderings of the object of inquiry, crafted and informed by 'configuration' as a method of assemblage that supports ethnographic study of contemporary socio-technical phenomena. We scrutinize our interdisciplinary bringing together of visualizing devices - timelines, collages, and sketches - and position them in the STS methods toolbox for inquiry and invention. These devices are key to investigating and engaging with the dynamics of configuring infrastructures intended to support scientific knowledge production. We conclude by observing how our three kinds of visualizing devices provide flexibility, comprehension and in(ter)ventive opportunities for study of and engagement with complex phenomena in-the-making.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)55-77
Number of pages23
JournalScience and Technology Studies
Volume34
Issue number3
Early online date15 Apr 2021
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 15 Sept 2021
MoE publication typeA1 Journal article-refereed

Keywords

  • Visualizing devices
  • configuration
  • visualization practices of arts and design
  • collaborative ethnography
  • data generation and transformation
  • complex phenomena in-the-making

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