In progress — we are still adding some readings, but please go ahead with Week 1!
| Week 1 | Sept 11 | Introduction | Geoffrey Bowker and Susan Leigh Star, To classify is human Optional/in class mention: Plato, Phaedrus |
| Week 2 | Sept 18 | Taxonomy | Michel Foucault, Natural history and structure Rachel Ankeny and Sabina Leonelli, What’s so special about model organisms? Optional/in class mention: Alfred Kinsey, code sheet Optional/in class mention: Lorraine Daston, On scientific observation Optional: attend Nicole Nelson’s STS lunch right after class |
| Week 3 | Sept 25 | Definitions | Mary Douglas, The abominations of Leviticus (pp. 42-58) Imre Lakatos, Proofs and refutations Optional/in class mention: legal definitions of tomatoes and porn |
| Week 4 | Oct 2 | Censuses | Melissa Nobles, Preface to Shades of Citizenship (chapter 1 only) Ian Hacking, Public amateurs, secret bureaucrats Optional/in class mention: B. R. Ambedkar, From millions to fractions |
| Week 5 | Oct 9 | Producing data (structures) | Chris Phillips, The bases of data Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, Carl Correns’s Experiments on Xenia Iain Morland, Intersex Optional/in class mention: Geoffrey Bowker and Susan Leigh Star, The case of race classification and reclassification under apartheid Optional/in class mention: Dmitri Mendeleev’s periodic table |
| Week 6 | Oct 16 | Social learning/ machine learning | Sally Haslanger, Tracing the sociopolitical reality of race Quayshawn Spencer, How to be a biological racial realist Optional: Joseph M. Pierce, In search of an authentic Indian |
| Week 7 | Oct 23 | Medicine and representation | Steven Epstein, Histories of the human subject Sarah Igo, America in aggregate |
| Week 8 | Oct 30 | Mapping | Mark Monmonmier, Data maps: A thicket of thorny choices |
| Week 9 | Nov 6 | State as classifier | Nikolas Rose, Governing by numbers: Figuring out democracy James Scott, Seeing like a state (intro) |
| Week 10 | Nov 13 | Boundary work | Thomas Gieryn, Boundary-work and the demarcation of science from non-science Optional/in class mention: Manan Ahmed interview on youtube Optional: attend Crystal Lee’s STS lunch right after class |
| Week 11 | Nov 20 | Policing | Sylvia Wynter, No humans involved: An open letter to my colleagues Optional: attend Laura Alex Frye-Levine’s STS lunch right after class |
| Nov 26 | no classes | ||
| Week 12 | Dec 4 | Species | Syl Ko, By “human,” everybody just means “white” Donna Haraway, selections from The Companion Species Manifesto (pp. 93-124) Optional/in class mention: Louis Menand, Morton, Agassiz and the origins of scientific racism in the U.S. |
| Week 13 | Dec 11 | Citizenship | Katherine Verdery, Whither ‘nation’ and ‘nationalism’ Lauren Berlant, Citizenship |
