Subversion, Conversion, Development: Cross-Cultural Knowledge Exchange and the Politics of Design (Infrastructures) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 026202716X ISBN 13: 9780262027168

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2014

Synopsis

Explorations of design, use, and reuse of information technology in diverse historical and cultural contexts.

This book explores alternative cultural encounters with and around information technologies. These encounters are alternative because they counter dominant, Western-oriented notions of media consumption; they include media practices as forms of cultural resistance and subversion, “DIY cultures,” and other nonmainstream models of technology production. The contributors―leading thinkers in science and technology studies, anthropology, and software design―pay special attention to the specific inflections that different cultures and communities give to the value of knowledge. The richly detailed accounts presented here challenge the dominant view of knowledge as a neutral good―information available for representation and encoding but separated from all social relations.

The chapters examine specific cases in which the forms of knowledge and cross-cultural encounters are shaping technology use and development. They consider design, use, and reuse of technological tools, including databases, GPS devices, books, and computers, in locations that range from Australia and New Guinea to Germany and the United States.

Contributors
Poline Bala, Alan Blackwell, Wade Chambers, Michael Christie, Hildegard Diemberger, Stephen Hugh-Jones, James Leach, Jerome Lewis, Dawn Nafus, Gregers Petersen, Marilyn Strathern, David Turnbull, Helen Verran, Laura Watts, Lee Wilson

About this title

About the Author

James Leach is Professor of Anthropology and ARC Future Fellow at the School of Social and Cultural Studies at the University of Western Australia and Directeur de Recherche at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique/CREDO, France.

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 026202716X
• ISBN 13: 9780262027168
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 272
• Editor: Leach James, Wilson Lee