We have a spectacular line-up of scholarly work, please see the abstracts here,
Here is the KFM triple session abstract:
Knowledge from the margins is of longstanding interest to the field of Science and Technology Studies. Modern technoscientific knowledge is typically understood to be produced for patent, profit, and/or its liberal virtues. The early focus on innovative knowledge resulted primarily in elite histories of Western (typically male and Caucasian) technologists and scientists going through the frustrations and satisfactions of life in laboratories. However, such studies begged the question, where does this knowledge go, what does it do, and for whom? Later STS scholars often explored this question from the point of view of those in 'the margins' who are: peripheral to modern knowledge production (e.g. civil society organizations, laypersons); 'lacking' modern knowledge production (e.g. non-Western, indigenous); or excluded from modern knowledge production (e.g. female, minority, disabled).
This triple session will demonstrate how a theoretical focus on knowledge from the margins resists typical ways of conceptualizing producers, users and innovation, and radicalizes thinking about institutional change. Part I will topically focus on 'sciences from below' and how they question assumptions about the knowledge production process that are common to Western societies. Part II will demonstrate how perturbing the user/producer boundary resists typical ways of thinking about the design and consumption of information and communications technologies. Part III will discuss how modern ideologies of technocracy and/or neoliberalism shape local knowledge and, conversely, allow for local knowledge to challenge expert regulation. STS and other scholars in women's studies,geography, political sociology of science, and sociology of technology will be interested in this session.