Luis Reyes-Galindo

Resumen: Este artículo presenta el método micro-sociológico de 'comprensión participante', volcado hacia los Estudios Sociales de la Ciencia y la Tecnología (ESCT), se ilustra su aplicación concreta mediante la descripción de dos proyectos de investigación desarrollados con dicha metodología. La presentación comparativa busca evidenciar dos dimensiones cruciales para todo investigador que desarrolle un estudio de caso dentro del campo: 1) el nivel de socialización lingüística del investigador dentro de la comunidad científica la cual es objeto de estudio y 2) el nivel de socialización lingüística dentro de la cultura de los estudios sobre ciencia contemporáneos. Palabras clave: socialización lingüística, diseño de trabajo de campo, entrevistas, conocimiento tácito, experticia. Abstract: This paper discusses the micro-sociological 'participant comprehension' method in Science and Technology Studies (STS) and illustrates its concrete application in two research projects developed within this framework. The comparative presentation seeks to highlight two crucial issues for researchers in STS: 1) the STS researcher's levels of linguistic socialization into the scientific community which is the object of study and (2) the level of linguistic socialization within the cultures of contemporary STS.

Cardiff sciSCREEN is a public engagement programme that brings together local experts and publics to discuss issues raised by contemporary cinema. Since 2010, Cardiff sciSCREEN (short for science on screen) has exhibited more than 50 films alongside short talks and discussions that draw on a range of disciplinary perspectives to explore the broad repertoire of themes found within different film genres. The aim of Cardiff sciSCREEN is to increase the local community's access to university research, whilst enabling university staff and students to engage a variety of publics with their work. In this paper, we first describe our method of public engagement, then draw on data from a research survey we administered to sciSCREENers to discuss the relationship between the theory and practice of public engagement. Using research from public understanding of science (PUS), public engagement with science and technology (PEST), science and technology studies (STS), and film literacy, we discuss the ways in which our flexible characterisation of science has made the programme inclusive, attracting a wide and varied audience. We consider the benefits of cross-disciplinary perspectives when communicating and engaging contemporary developments in science, where the term science is taken to stand for the breadth of academic research and not merely the natural sciences, as well as discussing the importance of space in public engagement events. Three Key Points • Cardiff sciSCREEN is an effective public engagement initiative with which to engage publics with contemporary scientific and societal issues. The screening of a film creates a shared experience between panellists and attendees. • Attendees enjoy the pan-disciplinary perspective provided my multiple speakers from different disciplinary backgrounds. • Public engagement is more than an activity. It is a process, and engagement programmes should be flexible enough to develop and adapt over time.

In this paper we illustrate the tension between mainstream 'normal', 'unorthodox' and 'fringe' science that is the focus of two ongoing projects that are analysing the full ecology of physics knowledge. The first project concentrates on empirically understanding the notion of consensus in physics by investigating the policing of boundaries that is carried out at the arXiv preprint server, a fundamental element of the contemporary physics publishing landscape. The second project looks at physics outside the mainstream and focuses on the set of organisations and publishing outlets that have mushroomed outside of mainstream physics to cover the needs of 'alternative', 'independent' and 'unorthodox' scientists. Consolidating both projects into the different images of science that characterise the mainstream (based on
consensus) and the fringe (based on dissent), we draw out an explanation of why today's social scientists ought to make the case that, for policy-making purposes, the mainstream's consensus should be our main source of technical knowledge.

We add a small increment to understanding the notion of ‘Primary Source Knowledge, knowledge that the non-expert and the citizen can acquire by assiduously reading the primary scientific journal literature without being embedded in the cultural life of the corresponding technical specialty. We expose four papers to the automated computer filters used by the physics preprint server arXiv to test whether the filters are able to flag papers that, while technically adequate, are now considered ‘outdated’ and ignorable by a research community. Taking the filters as (generous) proxies for non-experts, the answer has important ramifications in terms of the usability of scientific information by non-experts, citizens, policymakers and other audiences who are outsiders to scientific research communities. Our results suggest constraints on the level of usability that scientific knowledge has for non-expert audiences, even in the face of the unrestricted availability of scientific repositories like arXiv.

We analyse a recent paper by Goddiksen (2014) where the author raises questions about the relationship  between authorship, attribution and Collins & Evans’ concept of contributory and interactional expertise. We then highlight recent empirical work in the sociology of climate change science that has made similar points in order to clarify how authorship, division of labour and contribution are handled in real scientific settings. Despite this, Goddiksen’s critique of both contributory and interactional expertise is ultimately ineffective because it rests on a misguided attempt to de-socialise these concepts. We conclude by stressing the importance of collective tacit knowledge acquisition through immersion as a critical step in becoming a full-blown contributory or interactional expert.

During 2015 an unusually large number of articles denouncing seagull 'antisocial behaviour' appeared in the British press, with public outcry pushing for culls to seagull populations and political figures like former Prime Minister David Cameron publicly denouncing a 'seagull problem'. We analyse the discourses surrounding these negative representations and compare these to the few published scientific responses to the media hype. We look at how cultural values surrounding wildlife moulded the controversy and the vitriolic attacks on seagulls by the general public, then compared them to previous cases of wildlife demonization. Specifically, we illustrate how i) seagulls were first anthropomorphised and then demonised using discourses of social deviancy; ii) boundary-breaching is used as the rhetorical source for pestilence discourses. We conclude by considering how science communication and journalism could be better carried out in similar episodes by firstly considering them as distinct cultural practices, embedded in specific socio-cultural milieus that are too-often ignored by science.

Module outline for postgraduate course in advanced STS topics as part of a British Academy Newton Mobility Grant awarded to L. Reyes-Galindo and T. Duarte. The course was taught at the Social Sciences Institute of the University of Brasilia during the first half of 2016.

The report presents an analysis of the current Brazilian national perspectives on responsibility in science, technology and innovation policy, and empirically contextualises it through two organisations: the State University of Campinas (UNICAMP) and the São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP).