Situated Knowledge

Standpoint theory is a social epistemology and aligned methodological stance predicated on the understanding that, as recent work in Science and Technology Studies (STS) has shown, scientific knowledge of all kinds is irreducibly social (e.g., see Science, Sociology of). It is characterized by a distinctive ‘inversion’ thesis according to which those who are marginalized or oppressed, and therefore often discounted as knowers, may in fact be better positioned to understand social relations and a range of other phenomena than those who are comparatively privileged. This thesis underpins research programs within the social and behavioral sciences and offers a rationale for participatory action and community-based collaborative research (PAR, CBPR) captured by critical race theorists, feminists and others who advocate ‘starting research from the margins’. It has also been extended to the biological and physical sciences by practitioners and STS scholars who are intent on understanding how the social relations that structure scientific inquiry shape research agendas and outcomes across the sciences.

This thesis is composed of my original work, and contains no material previously published or written by another person except where due reference has been made in the text. I have clearly stated the contribution by others to jointly-authored works that I have included in my thesis.

The focus of this thesis is the search for a Theater of Situations, structuring operation’s modes of acting, play, and situational construction on the street, identifying possibilities for transformation in the social environment, since we situate ourselves in the context of a spectacular society even in different  urban  spaces  around  the  world.  The  streets,  characterized  by  impersonality  and simultaneously having the function of serving as transitionspaces, and, in this case, without any identity, not for not having one, but for presenting multiple of them, these anonymous and fluid spaces,  used  for  infinite  purposes,  but,  especially  as  places  that  serve  to  reinforce  rules,  social inequality, the desire for consumption through intense marketing, can also be transgressed and used for art in direct contact with people of all types and the possibility of construction of situations. The Modus Operranteof a Theater of Situations for the construction of urban actions, a situational theater, is presented in this work as a power’s possibility of transformation when these strategic procedures  identified  here  are  put  in  practice,  and  also  related  to:  Occupation  and  Invasion,  as seminal  references  of  a  Theater  of  Situations  and  this  thesis,  for  example  the  Situationist International and the Theater of the Oppressed; Observation and Invisibility, as studies to present the methodology used in this research; Displacement and Malpractice, about the current context between  art  and  politics  in  which  such  practice  is  based;  Appropriation  and  Incorporation, regarding the aspect of a possible training for performance, such as notions of preparation, for a urban  action,  and  their  creative  processes.  Such  strategies  are  analyzed  along  with  the  auto ethnographic reflections on acting,  theatrical  and performative,  through practical  and theoretical research in directing performances carried out since 2001, in the development of ERRO Grupo’s, from Florianópolis, its works, theatrical pieces, urban interventions, installations, and procedural documents  which  establishes  an  investigation  and  trajectory  of  construction  of  urban  situations, operating actions in the streets that make possible for this thesis the identification of procedures of action in the urban space.


RESUMOO foco desta tese é a busca por um Teatro de Situações, na estruturação de modos de operação de atuação,  jogo,  e  construção  situacional  na  rua,  identificando  possibilidades  de  transformação  no ambiente  social,  uma  vez  que  estamos  situados  no  contexto  de  uma  sociedade  espetacular  até mesmo  em  diferentes  espaços  urbanos  ao  redor  do  mundo.  As  ruas,  caracterizadas  pela impessoalidade e por simultaneamente terem a função de servir como espaços de transição, e, neste caso, sem nenhuma identidade, não por não tê-la, mas por apresentar múltiplas delas, estes espaços anônimos  e  fluidos,  utilizados  para  infinitas  finalidades,  mas,  especialmente  como  lugares  que servem  para  reforçar  regras,  a  desigualdade  social,  o  desejo  de  consumo  através  de  intenso marketing, também podem ser transgredidos e usados para a arte no contato direto com as pessoas de todos os tipos e na possibilidade de construção de situações. O Modus Operrantede um Teatro de Situações para a construção de ações urbanas, um teatro situacional, é apresentado neste trabalho como  possibilidade  de  potência  de  transformação  quando  coloca-se  em  prática  o  uso  de procedimentos  estratégicos  identificados  aqui  como,  e  também  relacionados  à:  Ocupação  e Invasão, como referências seminais de um Teatro de Situações e desta tese, exemplo a Internacional Situacionista e o Teatro do Oprimido; Observação e Invisibilidade, como estudos para apresentar a  metodologia  empregada  nesta  pesquisa;  Deslocamento  e  Malversação,  sobre  o  contexto  atual entre  arte  epolítica  na  qual  tal  prática  está  embasadas;  Apropriação  e  Incorporação,  quanto  ao aspecto  de  um  possível  treinamento para  atuação,  como noções  de  preparação,  para  uma  ação urbana,  e  seus  processos  criativos.  Tais  estratégias  são  analisadas  junto  às  reflexões autoetnográficas  sobre  atuação  teatral  e  performativa  através  da  pesquisa  prática  e  teórica  em direção  teatral  realizada desde  2001,  no  desenvolvimento  das  obras,  performances,  intervenções urbanas, instalações, e documentos processuais do ERRO Grupo,de Florianópolis, que estabelece uma  investigação  e  trajetória  de  construção  de  situações  urbanas,  operando  ações  nas  ruas  que possibilitam para esta tese a identificação de procedimentos de atuação no espaço urbano.

Das Konzept des situierten Wissens entwickelt die Wissenschaftsphilosophin Donna J. Haraway (*1944) im Zuge ihrer Auseinandersetzung mit feministischer Objektivität im Jahr 1988 (vgl. Haraway 1995a). Ausgangspunkt des wissenschaftstheoretischen Konzepts ist die Kritik an Objektivität als wissenschaftlichem Beschreibungsmodus in der modernen Experimentalwissenschaft, in dem ein scheinbar neutrales, also körper-und standortloses Wissenschaftssubjekt universell gültige Ergebnisse erzeugt. Im Unterschied zur Vorstellung eines Universalwissens versteht Haraway Wissen prinzipiell in konstitutiver Beziehung zu historischen Gesellschaftsund Herrschaftsformen, Technologien der Wissensgenerierung und sprach-und erkenntnistheoretischen Mustern (vgl. Haraway, 1995a, S. 74). Haraway entwirft ein Verständnis von Wissensformen, das sich gegen Annahmen der Universalität und Neutralität von Wissen richtet, und das sie situiert nennt, was, erstens, meint, dass jede Wissensform immer historisch und kulturell spezifisch ist und, zweitens, dass es das eine Wissen, das über allen anderen Wissensformen steht, nicht gibt, sondern immer nur partiale Weisen vielfältiger Wissensformen (knowledges).

Despite obvious affinities with feminist research programs in neighboring fields and the feminist commitments of its founders, several prominent advocates of “gender archaeology” explicitly reject any feminist “influences.” This reflects ambivalence about the broader epistemic implications of their content critiques of androcentrism in archaeology: that these raise deeper questions about the viability of “aperspectival” ideals of objectivity. I argue that, in exposing the situated partiality of mainstream archaeology, gender archaeology is a form of reluctant social constructionism. Rather than capitulate to critics who insist that this threat to objectivist ideals must be circumscribed, I advocate reformulating them in proceduralist terms.

Published in Portuguese as “Os que conhecem, conhecem bem: teoria do ponto de vista e arqueologia de gênero”: special issue of Scientiae Studia on ‘Feminist Approaches to Philosophy and Sociology of Science,” edited by Sylvia Gemignani, Márcia Tait and Hugh Lacy, 15.1 (2017): 13-38.

Available online as the 2016 Katz Distinguished Lecture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucEM1t3Drek

Dans les perspectives du constructivisme et de l’action située, une compétence se définit comme un pouvoir adaptatif à une famille de situations. Ce pouvoir adaptatif correspond à la réflexion en cours d’action et à la réflexion sur l’action. La réflexion en cours d’action renvoie à une conscience agissante qui opère en situation. La réflexion sur l’action renvoie à une conscience réflexive qui met à distance la situation d’action : elle opère hors situation. Le pouvoir adaptatif de la compétence est différencié en quatre pouvoirs : construire la situation, se positionner en situation, transformer la situation et prendre un recul réflexif. Les trois premiers pouvoirs relèvent de la réflexion en cours d’action et le quatrième de la réflexion sur l’action.

A survey on the concern of feminist epistemology shows that Feminist Epistemology is an outgrowth of feminist theorizing about gender and traditional epistemological concerns. Feminist epistemology postulates an experiential kind of knowledge. The central theme of Feminist Epistemology is situated knowledge. In achieving their pursuit, feminist employ three paradigms namely feminist empiricism, standpoint, and feminist postmodernism. But what difference does feminist epistemology offer? This is the concern of this work.

Mass tourism is a concept that has been used for decades in academic and public travel discussions, and thus it serves a purpose. Mass tourism is often used to refer to the early phases of air-based mass tourism since the 1960s, concerning the remarkable growth in tourist numbers, democratization of tourism, standardization of products and societal transformations. It is also used to emphasize certain motivations, behaviours and values in tourism that are seen as typical for mass tourism separating it from other contemporary or ‘alternative’ forms of tourism. This distinction frequently produces taken for granted or simplified categorizations both in tourism studies and in public discourses.
Within tourism studies discussions about the conceptualization of mass tourism between
different traditions have been almost non-existent. In this study, my interest is in the different ways mass tourism can be conceptualized. Tourism is now a larger phenomenon than ever and transformations have occurred in its production and consumption, demanding that the limits and possibilities of the concept of mass tourism need to be evaluated in new ways.

This thesis contributes a conceptualization of mass tourism by addressing the academic discourses of mass tourism and discursive practices of professional social groups. The idea of mass tourism is approached from different strands of constructionist thought in order to create dialogues. The situated nature of knowledge and researcher positionality are also addressed in relation to knowledge creation of mass tourism. The thesis concentrates empirically on the stereotypical form of mass tourism, charter-based package holidays in the course of contemporary transformations in tourism. This Finnish case is useful because mass package tourism has traditionally been ‘travel for all’, offering
a more democratic context for discussing the possibilities and limits of the mass tourism category.

This dissertation consists of four studies that each shed light on the conceptualization of mass tourism with different materials and frameworks. The majority of the thesis is based on the empirical material that includes two sets of semi-structured interviews of 29 charter package tourism professionals. Pair interviews were conducted in 2011 for Finnish-based travel agents and individual interviews for Finnish tourist guides took place in Crete in 2013. Secondary material of academic research writings on mass tourism was utilized in one of the studies.

The findings of the study reveal that mass tourism is a concept with a lot of historical weight, which guides its current categorization and interpretation in both academic and industry institutional settings. However, mass tourism is not easily defined, thus based on this study I propose a framework for more dialogical conceptualization of mass tourism. The framework starts with the contextualization of mass tourism (knowledge) as situated and proceeds addressing the plural-singular relationship of the ‘mass’ as a dynamic ‘mass effect’. These formulations are in connection with three intertwined possible versions of mass tourism: a quantitative category, a model(s) in tourism or as a ‘super-umbrella’ concept for contemporary travel. I encourage the research community to consider these
aspects in relation to one another and position different cases within the framework. The framework shows that mass tourism conceptualization is a multidimensional process that includes choices with effects. This study suggests that the usefulness of mass tourism as a concept for research lies in building its future bases on inter- or post-disciplinary dialogues, which could better serve critical academic inquiry, and give purchase to the concept in describing tourism of today.

The question of the objectivity of knowledge is an omnipresent debate in academia. Not only because there are so many ways to approach it, but also, because science has a certain progressive process, just like history, which makes change inevitable. And so, new ways of dealing with and understanding information keep emerging; in order to answer the new challenges to such old debates. Donna Haraway's 1988 paper titled " Situated Knowledge: The Science Question in Feminism and the Privilege of Partial Perspective " , brought a new way of looking at the epistemological question of how we construct knowledge. According to her; no importance is given to a certain insight just because it is from an outsider or an insider, since all the interactions necessary for such knowledge production are power related. Which can be quite debatable, since in today's world, we have a certain differentiation between these two lenses: an outsider tends to be more objective while the insider would contribute either with a partisan perspective or a richer objective standing point based on a firsthand experience with the subject matter.

La compétence est définie comme un pouvoir adaptatif développé par la personne en situation durant toute son existence. Les liens entre compétence et situation ne sont pas suffisamment explicités dans la littérature. La notion de compétence est donc revisitée dans le cadre de diverses perspectives situées : action située, cognition située, cognition distribuée, intelligence distribuée, intelligence collective et énaction. Chacune de ces perspectives permet de reconnaître des caractéristiques de la compétence : elle peut être individuelle ou collective; elle est aussi distribuée, en ce sens qu’elle n’est pas exclusivement cognitive mais relève aussi des éléments de la situation; elle est enfin énactée.

This is a short paper (in Spanish) offered at a shared online session with Hilan Bensusan (University of Brasilia) organised by the Centre of Philosophical Investigations (CIeFI) at the Faculty of Humanities and Educational Sciences (FaHCE) of the National University of La Plata (UNLP), Argentine, in April 19, 2022, on the possibility of cross-examining the Platonic notion of εἴδη (“ideas”) and the Yanomami notion of utupë (“images”). It draws on a longer essay of mine (in English) to be included in a volume on interpretation, representation, and language edited by Fionn Bennett for the University of Reims Press, in which I expressly address such cross-examination in full depth from its very first page; the introduction to, and references included in, that essay are available here.
I had wrote that long essay, sent it to Fionn Bennet, uploaded its introductory section to academia.edu, and created a public discussion session on the whole essay again at academia.edu between the end of January and the beginning of February 2022. And I invited Hilan Bensusan to join that public discussion session, which he did. I invited him, among other things, because in September 2021 (while my wife and I had the pleasure of hosting Hilan in our house in Spain, among other things, to help him organise an online seminar on his new Indexicalism book) Hilan and I had started to work in a collaborative project around the notions of “indices,” “spectres,” and εἴδη, plus in mid-January 2022 we had exchanged a few letters on such matters, in the first of which I had expressly put forward an evenemential, rather than purely notional, approach to εἶδος. For while Hilan had originally contributed to that incipient project the first two notions (“indexicals,” “spectres”) I had originally contributed to it the latter notion (εἴδη).
To my surprise, however, Hilan’s own text (“¿Eran los eidoi [sic], xapiris?”) for the online session organised by the CIeFI in April 2022 entirely omitted my work on εἶδος and did not mention either my essay on εἶδος and utupë – whereas I have always cited his work and his contribution to our collaborative project in my writings. Additionally in his text Hilan introduced “his” own reinterpretation of εἶδος, the conclusion of which was entirely different from mine, but whose overall premise – namely, the need to rethink εἶδος otherwise than we have been taught, in, say, φύσις-oriented terms and with the help of comparative anthropology – coincided with mine. More specifically, Hilan attributed to himself the initiative to cross-examine the notions or εἶδος and utupë, on which he had written nothing prior to April 2022 but on which, as he perfectly knew, I had written my long essay for Fionn Bennett’s edited volume.
Therefore, in this short paper for the online session of April 19 at the UNLP – to which, incomprehensibly, Hilan, who initially figured alone in the programme, invited me to participate in the very last minute, as though his obliteration of my own work and his unacknowledged appropriation of my ideas could prove indifferent to me – in addition to summarising my earlier work on εἶδος and on εἶδος and utupë I complain about Hilan’s lack of collegiality and academic honesty. I do so in the nota bene preceding the main text, which contests Hilan’s interpretation of εἶδος and utupë by claiming that a subtractive approach these makes no sense, since neither in ancient-Greek culture nor in the Amazonian worlds is being qua presence objectionable as such, even if it must assume limits; pretending otherwise amounts, in my view, to anachronistically project postmodern deconstructionist concerns onto them.

Contemporary theorizations of neoliberalism are framed by a false dichotomy between, on the one hand, studies influenced by Foucault in emphasizing neoliberalism as a form of governmentality, and on the other hand, inquiries influenced by Marx in foregrounding neoliberalism as a hegemonic ideology. This article seeks to shine some light on this division in an effort to open up new debates and recast existing ones in such a way that might lead to more flexible understandings of neoliberalism as a discourse. A discourse approach moves theorizations forward by recognizing neoliberalism is neither a ‘top down’ nor ‘bottom up’ phenomena, but rather a circuitous process of socio-spatial transformation.

Trans*Forschung, insbesondere wenn von Trans*Menschen selbst durchge-führt, steht wie andere politische Wissenschaftsprojekte auch, unter dem Ver-dacht, nicht wertneutral, »objektiv« und somit nicht »richtig wissenschaft-lich« zu sein. Der Artikel fragt anhand der Wissenschaftstheorie Donna Hara-ways nach dem Warum solcher Abwertungen bestimmter Formen von Wissenschaft und nach alternativen Konzepten von Objektivität. Haraways »Situierte Wissen« werden exemplarisch anhand der Trans*Forschung er-läutert. Ihre Theorie begreift die Produktion von Wissen als verkörpert und verortet und kann zeigen, inwiefern Wissenschaft immer schon ein politi-sches Projekt ist und nicht erst, wenn sie heteronormative Zweigeschlecht-lichkeit kritisiert. Sie stellt somit einen interessanten Ausgangspunkt für die Frage dar, wie Trans*Forschung verantwortungsbewusstes Wissen generie-ren kann, das weder rein subjektiv ist noch Ansprüche auf totalisierende und übergeneralisierte absolute Wahrheiten stellt, aber möglicherweise zur Ver-besserung der Leben von Trans*Menschen beitragen kann. Der Begriff der Trans*Forschung bezieht sich auf das international noch junge interdisziplinäre Forschungsfeld der Transgender Studies.

Abstract: Many studies have provided information about different individual, social and cultural factors for the increase of new cases of HIV infection among men who have sex with other men (MSM). However, there has been little analysis to the role of HIV-prevention programmes in the understanding of the deliberate assumption of risk in sex between men. Following sociological debates about the effects of governmentality in health promotion, this work examines the extent to which HIV-prevention campaigns addressed to MSM in Spain are implicated in the construction of a social context where the assumption of risk is possible. This qualitative research is carried out by conducing interviews with men who consciously assume risk in their sexual practices with other men (barebackers) and HIV-prevention technicians. Simultaneously, critical discourse analysis is used to examine the discourse of HIV prevention campaigns addressed to MSM in Spain in three levels of analysis: (i) pragmatic, (ii) semantic-predicative and (iii) rhetoric-argumentative. Based on the analysis of interviews and campaigns, and from a critical social approach grounded in situated knowledge, this work argues that the implication of Spanish LGBT activism and the social link between AIDS and masculine homosexuality from the outset of this disease have given safer sex (between men) a moral value. At the same time, the creation of a scenario where sexual care is perceived as desirable also raises a subjection process where individuals are urged to answer whether they engage in safer sex practices or not, all the more since Prevention messages are constructed as imperatives. Besides, this kind of messages affects HIV-positive people, whose sexual health is often reduced to the avoidance of new virus transmissions. Therefore, the doctoral thesis concludes that a new perspective of intervention is necessary to address the realities of HIV infections among MSM in contemporary Spanish context.

Resumen: Varios estudios han ofrecido información acerca de los diferentes motivos (individuales, sociales y culturales) por los que siguen aumentando los casos de infección por VIH en hombres que tienen sexo con otros hombres (HSH). Sin embargo, se ha prestado poca atención al papel que juegan los programas de prevención del VIH en la comprensión de la asunción deliberada de riesgo en el sexo entre hombre. de prevención en este contexto. Siguiendo los debates sociológicos sobre los efectos de la gubernamentalidad en la promoción de la salud, este trabajo analiza hasta qué punto la prevención del VIH dirigida a los HSH en España está implicada en la construcción de un contexto social en el que la asunción del riesgo es posible y, en algunos casos, deseada. Esta investigación cualitativa se ha llevado a cabo mediante la realización de entrevistas a hombres que asumen, de forma deliberada, riesgo en sus prácticas sexuales con otros hombres (barebackers) y a técnicos que trabajan en la promoción de la salud sexual. De forma paralela, el análisis crítico del discurso se ha usado para examinar el discurso de las campañas de prevención del VIH dirigidas a HSH en España desde tres niveles de análisis: (i) pragmático, (ii) semántico-predicativo y (iii) retórico-argumentativo. Basándose en el análisis de las entrevistas y las campañas, y desde una perspectiva social crítica fundamentada en los conocimientos situados, este trabajo argumenta que la implicación del activismo LGTB español y la relación social entre sida y homosexualidad masculina, desde los inicios de la enfermedad, le han otorgado al sexo (entre hombres) un valor moral. Del mismo modo, la creación de un escenario en el que el cuidado sexual es percibido como deseable también genera un proceso de sujeción en el que los individuos deben responder si tienen prácticas sexuales (o no), más aun cuando los mensajes preventivos se construyen en imperativo. Además, este tipo de mensajes tiene un efecto en las personas con VIH cuya salud sexual es reducida, de forma general, a la evitación de la transmisión del virus. Por ello, esta tesis concluye que es necesaria una nueva perspectiva de intervención que tenga en cuenta las necesidades de todos los hombres que tienen sexo con otros hombres en el contexto social actual.

" L’approche située ou approche par situations (APS), s’introduit progressivement dans les réformes en éducation en tant que prolongement ou solution de remplacement à l’approche par compétences (APC). Récemment, par exemple, on a organisé des contenus de programmes d’études autour de classes-situations. Alors que dans certaines perspectives de l’APC, la compétence renvoie à la maîtrise de savoirs décontextualisés, les tenants de l’APS la définissent plutôt en termes de maîtrise des situations. Dans l’APS, le développement de compétences et de connaissances se déploie en contexte, dans et par l’action en situation. Cet ouvrage collectif présente différentes interprétations de l’APS. On est loin d’une pensée unique. La diversité des pistes suggérées d’un chapitre à l’autre laissent toutefois entrevoir un cheminement vers une approche située partagée et comprise dans un sens général. L’APS est traitée dans divers champs de l’éducation : enquêtes internationales dans le domaine; apprentissage informel en milieu de travail; formation des enseignants et élaboration des profils de sortie; élaboration des programmes d’études; administration scolaire; conception des manuels scolaires; enseignement, apprentissage et évaluation. L’APS est comparée à diverses perspectives théoriques, dont celles de la pédagogie par objectifs (PPO), l’APC, l’approche communicative (en langues), l’approche par problèmes, le béhaviorisme, le cognitivisme, le constructivisme, le socioconstructivisme, l’action située, la cognition située, la cognition distribuée et l’énaction. Bref, cet ouvrage présente un large éventail de réflexions, de pratiques et de recherches relatives à l’APS.

Accès au premier chapitre: https://www.academia.edu/1067989/Lexperience_en_action_la_cle_dune_approche_dite_situee

Télécharger le livre: https://www.approcheenactive.com/about-7

In this contribution to the Routledge Companion to Feminist Philosophy I focus on the work analytic feminist philosophers of science have done, often in dialog with practitioners, on a set of epistemic and methodological questions raised by explicitly feminist research programs in the social sciences. These critical and constructive interventions – which represent significant, often transformative contributions across the social sciences – pose a significant philosophical challenge to dominant “value free” ideals of epistemic integrity and objectivity inasmuch as they arise from an explicitly situated, political angle of vision. I consider two points of feminist engagement with this challenge. One is the “feminist method” debate of the 1970s and 1980s in which feminist social scientists, joined by feminist philosophers, wrestled with the question of what it means to do social science as a feminist. The second is feminist standpoint theory, as developed since the early 1980s by feminist social scientists and philosophers who take on directly the question of why it is that, contra dominant wisdom, situated interests and values not only play an ineliminable role in inquiry but, time and again, prove to be a crucial resource in improving the reach and credibility of social research.

In Language, Interpretation, Representation: Cross-Cultural, Transhistorical and Interdisciplinary Perspectives, ed. Fionn Bennett for the Collection Langage et pensée (Éditions et Presses Universitaires de Reims)

Abstract: In this essay I contend that the contraposition of the Real and the Symbolic, of φύσις and εἶδος, which is not only a common theme but also one of the main political arguments in post-Nietzschean thought (from Bataille’s Acéphale to the speculative-realist plea for anti-correlationism), is ultimately unwarranted. In order to prove this I revisit a traditional philosophical concept: εἶδος (which is in Homer long before being in Plato, and for whose reassessment I moreover take Heraclitus into account) with the help of an unconventional tool: the Yanomami notion of utupë (“image”). I argue, first, that there is not so much term-to-term “correspondence” (adæquatio) between the Real and the Symbolic as what I propose to call “dissymmetric reciprocity” between  φύσις and εἶδος, and, secondly, that the latter is the “witness” to the former’s Ereignis. Furthermore I discuss current post-structuralist interpretations of the Yanomami notion of utupë in post-phenomenological terms. Lastly I reexamine in light of all this the relation between φύσις and its modern “enframing” or Ge-stell.

This paper critically reviews the current status of the concept of distance in human geography in order to argue that recent experimentally-driven work in construal-level theory offers ample opportunities for recasting distance as a key geographical trope. After analysing the four entangled dimensions of distance revealed by construal-level theory (spatial distance; temporal distance; social distance; and hypothetical distance), the paper articulates this research program from experimental psychology with geographical work on non-representational theory, geographical imaginations/imaginative geographies, learning as a geographical process, TimeSpace theorizing, and ontogenetic understandings of space. It is argued that the subjective understanding of distance afforded by construal-level theory can rescue distance from its entrenched association with positivistic geography and spatial analysis. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2016.07.018

Geography means earth writing, and so it is perhaps fitting that writing itself has become a primary intellectual battleground in contemporary geographical thought. This paper advocates for metaphorical earth writing, arguing that it unchains our geographical imaginations from the shackles of our disciplinary past by boldly embracing geopoetics. I hope to spark debate by promoting the un-disciplining of geography as a means to open up a theoretical space for voice, where a material space of emancipation might follow. The notion that our epistemological, ontological, and methodological choices are not apolitical decisions without consequence guides my inquiry. Accordingly I critique the accusation of esotericism as a narrative that reifies the false dichotomy between academia and society. Aversion to metaphor fails to recognize the epistemological challenge it raises and underestimates how jargon combats commonsense notions that reinforce hierarchical power relations. How we write the earth constitutes a political choice, where disciplining others into a singular way of knowing, being, and doing geography is an affront to the possibilities of space. When we make space for earth writing as a beautiful flourishing of geopoetics, we place the earth at the center of experience, releasing the light and energy of a more powerful geography.

This graduate seminar explores some of the major theoretical trends in contemporary human geography. We will investigate key debates and concepts that inform current scholarship on social, cultural, political, and economic geographies using different lenses through which to understand geographical notions of space, place, and scale. The aims of the course are, therefore, threefold:

(1) to provide a solid foundation and appreciation for the diversity of contemporary perspectives in human geography;

(2) to examine major thematic areas of human geographical inquiry and debate;

(3) to, above all, cultivate one’s own “geographical imagination” by critically assessing current geographical scholarship while also contributing to the literature with an original piece of geographical research.

The format for class sessions will be based upon group discussions of the assigned readings, where students will have the opportunity to present to the class and facilitate at least one class discussion over the course of the semester.

In response to the claim that our sense of will is illusory, some philosophers have called for a better understanding of the phenomenology of agency. Although I am broadly sympathetic with the tenor of this response, I question whether the positive-theoretic blueprint it promotes truly heralds a tenable undertaking. Marshaling a Schopenhauerian insight, I examine the possibility that agency might not be amenable to phenomenological description. Framing this thesis in terms of Charles S. Peirce’s semiotic framework, I suggest a way to integrate the idea of streaming experiences with that of bodily strivings, which, owing to their primitive structure, can never be represented.

This paper argues that, in order to take place, space and scale more seriously in the study of our discipline, we have to complement the pervasive understanding of geography as a tradition of thought or an extended conversation with an understanding of our discipline as a tradition of practice, in which the main focus is on the becoming of geographers. It is argued that the theme of 'what it takes to be a good geographer' is a fertile way to study this process of becoming. The four main advantages of this approach are illustrated empirically in the body of the argument by the author's reflections on his socializing within two very different geographical traditions.

Thinking under Turbulence is conceived as a working-journal, as print- and online-version, in eleven sequences and one sequel. It brings together voices of closed seminars and public moments of one year Thinking under Turbulence: Geneva Colloquium which framed the 2015/16 transition of the CCC Research-Based Master Programme of the Visual Arts Department at the Haute école d’art et de design, HEAD – Genève. Thinking under turbulence operates in transgenerational time. It demands to question the dominance of one school of critique or one culture for taking collective positions. Thinking under turbulence departs and inscribes itself in our lived experiences as planetary subjects from which we must re-engineer our thinking. In other words, if there is “slow violence” (Rob Nixon) that inscribes itself across generations and geographies—often at thresholds of undetectability—then there must be slow revolution that stands with “revolutionary patience” as blogger and theorist Mark Fisher argued a year ago. More needs to be done.

Contributors and interlocutors to Thinking under Turbulence are Nabil Ahmed, Ursula Biemann, Yann Chateigné, Laboria Cuboniks/Helen Hester, Gregory Dapra, Kodwo Eshun, Anselm Franke, Laure Giletti, Fabien Giraud, Pierre Hazan, Yoneda Lemma, Armin Linke, Doreen Mende, Eric Philippoz, Griselda Pollock, farid rakun (ruangrupa), Gene Ray, Ida Soulard, Françoise Vergès and Eyal Weizman, among others, in conversation with CCC students 2015/16 Aurélien Ballif, Naouel Ben Aziza, Marie Van Berchem, Mandarava Bricaire, Duke Choi, Marguerite Davenport, Ana Raquel Ermida Gomes, Emmanuelle Esmail-Zavieh, Camille Kaiser, Charlyne Kolly, Alba Lage, Viola Lukács, Raphaëlle Mueller, Diego Orihuela, Camilla Paolino, Charles-Elie Payré, Julia Pecheur, Geneviève Romang, Stéphanie Serra, Dragos Tara, Adelina Tsagkari, Tina Wetchy and Yael Wicki. All contributions are original material in 192 pages.

Published by CCC/HEAD Geneva and Motto Books. Edited by Doreen Mende, 2017.

Among the changes brought by the new technologies of information and communication, the concept of radio has also acquired another dimension, especially how to make radio, what to communicate and why. Online broadcast and the emergence of podcasts allowed a greater openness of the radio space, a fact that has favored communication-focused social collectives and that are outside the institutional spheres. In several free radios, groups of women choose to promote counterinformation from feminisms, through the deconstruction of heteropatriarcal discourse, the spreading and creation of alternative discourses and the self-management of their voices. Giving prominence to daily individual and collective experiences. Moreover, given the available technology and diffusion through cyberspace, radio productions originated from such practices are becoming a way to network among feminist groups in different countries, encouraging a communication practice and activism that seek to break geographical barriers. This research emerges as a proposal of an approach to the problem of relations between social-political commitment and the practice of the communication and technology in the Network Society field through a critical discourse analysis of a feminist radio program. The program in question, Enredad@s, appeared in a free and self-managed radio from Malvarrosa, a suburb in the city of Valencia (Spain), and it is currently characterized by a transatlantic practice, with three production cores: Valencia , Buenos Aires and Mexico DF. Based on the situated knowledges (HARAWAY, 1995) as the appropriate episemological choice for a critical research, the shared feminist experience becomes an intersection field between scholar and militant activity. So that we can rethink the power relations and the relations between discourse and power (FOUCAULT, 2008; 1979) through the micropolitics and how they generate alternative discourses and affect changes in consciousness, through everyday and collective practices. On the other hand, is the network society a model of society favorable to feminist struggles? What do we understand by alternative discourses? Can we consider that feminists radio programs generate this kind of discourse? Whom do these discourses reach and what social impact do they have? These are some of the questions that this study suggests.

El objetivo de este artículo consiste en analizar el discurso literario acerca de la maternidad en la literatura en lengua vasca escrita por mujeres y su relación con la postura literaria. Las escritoras vascas han utilizado la intimidad como tema literario no solo como forma de transgredir el sistema heteropatriarcal, sino también como manera para conseguir una posición en el sistema de acceso restringido que es la literatura en lengua vasca. Entre los diferentes aspectos que incluye el concepto de intimidad, la maternidad es uno de los más tratados por las escritoras vascas.
La hipótesis de este trabajo es la siguiente: más allá de las restricciones reales que la maternidad conlleva, las escritoras vascas han de poner en escena un discurso sobre la maternidad negativo para lograr un espacio en el sistema literario como estrategia para construir una postura literaria significativa.
Siendo todo conocimiento un constructo social y en consecuencia toda investigación a priori subjetivo, he querido ponerme en el mismo plano crítico que el objeto/sujeto de estudio. Para ello he realizado un autorrelato que pone en relación mi “postura literaria” (Jérôme Meizoz), mi discurso paraliterario y literario referente a la maternidad y mi visión íntima y personal de la maternidad, alineándome así con el concepto de conocimiento situado de Donna Haraway. Partiendo de este conocimiento, he analizado los discursos acerca de la maternidad subyacentes en novelas escritas por mujeres y publicadas en lengua vasca entre los años 1979-2009 y la relación que estos guardan con la “postura literaria”  de las escritoras implicadas.

The single most important statement that can be made with regard to the logical status of human and physical geographical reasoning is that it belongs to the class of non-monotonic reasoning. In other words,  geographical reasoning is defeasible (i.e. earlier drawn conclusions can be defeated by the addition of new facts, some of which are generated by the very application of our ideas outside academe) and non-demonstrative (i.e. our beliefs about reality cannot be demonstrated once and for ever; we must do with building provisional arguments based on the current weight of the evidence, which itself changes with the times). Indeed, unlike mathematics, which is a closed world of formalisms that relies heavily on deduction, demonstration, and proof, geography studies and attempts to improve the real, messy world out there. Because that wild, unruly world is always in a process of becoming, the conclusions drawn yesterday may have to be abandoned today, and so on, without end in sight. The core virtue of geographical reasoning is not certainty, but adaptability. As the world changes, so do geography’s entertained beliefs about how to improve it. The point we are trying to make is that an alternative window into the nature of geographical reasoning, besides the one provided by the discipline’s key concepts, offers an opening toward the more subtle problematic of the mechanisms by which the updating of geographical beliefs operate.

Based on fieldwork conducted in Abomey in 2021, this article focuses on a "bo," one of the "amazon amulets" collected in 1890 by a French merchant from the corpses of the Agodjie (amazons) who fought and swayed the French colonial army. Currently housed at the Musée du Quai Branly in France, this amulet is not among the objects that France will return in the fall of 2021. In France as in Benin, it is never publicly mentioned. Consisting of human remains and an iguana head, it is identified as a "destructive bo" in the museum's notices. Yet the heiresses of the Amazons and Queen Hangbe (founder of this female army, who ruled from 1708 to 1711) and the kpɔjitɔ (women embodying the deceased queen mothers) tell a very different story about it: it is a "bo of forgetting," that is, a magical power that causes forgetting and confusion. Its uses can be personal, political and diplomatic. Considering this "bo of forgetting " as a metaphor of the patrimonial forgetting in which knowledge, transmissions and feminine powers are held, this article aims at restoring the history, the uses and the actuality of the matrimony of the Amazons of the kingdom of Abomey.

Toplumsal korkularımızın, meraklarımızın ve düşünmeyi ertelediklerimizin sonucu olarak zihinlerimizde yer etmiş uyaran (monere) ve işaret eden (monstrum) bir özne olan canavarın (monster) peşine düşüyorum. Canavarın sürekli değişen ve düşlenen bir yaratım olması; toplumsal ahlakın dayattığı mevcut değerleri, normları ve kategorileri istikrarsızlaştırarak ideolojik olarak hiç kimsenin boyunduruğu altına girmeyip hiçbir kimsenin “özel” amaçları tarafından kullanılamamasını sağlıyor. “Faydacı” olamayışından öte iktidarın bir yere yerleştirmek için can attığı taksonomi veya diğer sınıflandırma sistemlerine ontolojik yapısından dolayı zaten dahil olamıyor. Tam da bu haliyle canavar deyim yerindeyse “kimseye çaktırmadan” hareket ederek hem kendini hem de çevresini kentin içinde yeni bir katman olarak kuruyor. Canavar bedenine bakışımı Spinoza felsefesini yorumlayan Deleuze’ün sürekli bir halden öteki hale dönüşen oluş (becoming) halindeki beden fikri üzerine kuruyorum. Erilliğin evrensel aklın ve rasyonel düşüncenin temeli olarak alındığından hareketle tüm oluşların temelinin aslında kadın-oluştan geçtiğini; oluşun mutlaka kadın yani azınlık olan ile başladığı fikriyle temellenen ikilikleri, sınırları ve durağan bedenleri-nesneleri bozan; yersiz-yurtsuzlaştıran Deleuzyen düşünceyi benimseyen feminist ve queer teorinin içinde kendimi konumlandırıyorum.

Canavar imgeleminin bize neler söyleyebileceğini; yüzyıllardır sözlü tarihte, mitolojide, edebiyatta, sinemada yer etmiş bazı örneklemler aracılığıyla tartışmaya açıyorum. Uyaran ve işaret eden bir özne olarak canavarın toplumun kimi zaman bilemediği, düşünmek istemediği, hafızadan silmeye çalıştığı veya topluma unutturulmak istenen; kısacası toplumda travma etkisi yaratan bir olay örüntüsünün belki de diyaloğa girmeyi ve mücadele etmeyi kolaylaştırdığından bedenleştirilerek yazıldığını; bu metinlerin görsel, yazınsal, işitsel ya da davranışsal temsil ortamlarında var olabildiklerini görüyorum.

Mevcut iktidarın kimlikleri sabitleyen ve denetleyen stratejilerine karşı bu stratejilerin boşluklarından faydalanıp canavarları ortaya çıkaran “alıntılama”, “bedenleşme”, “farklılaşma” ve “sınırları bulanıklaştırma” gibi taktikler yardımıyla canavarı analojik bir ilişkisellikle hem biçimsel hem de bedensel olarak oluş halinde yazan; canavarın üretiminin hem öncesine hem de sonrasına tanık olabildiğim ve metnin yazarının –dolayısıyla da toplumun- içinden geçtiği dönemle ilişkisini gözlemleyebildiğim bir örnek olduğundan Mary Shelley’nin “Frankenstein ya da Modern Prometheus” metnini anlatıbilimin kavramlarının ve görsel, yazınsal, işitsel ya da davranışsal
ortamlardan çağırdığım başka örneklemlerin yardımıyla söküyorum.

Kentin kendisinin; şeylerin düzeninden kaçan; parçalı, parçalanması gereken ve sonra çoklu imkânlar dahilinde yeniden bir araya getirilmesi gereken bir metin olduğundan hareketle sürekli yeniden yazılan canavar bedenini, Shelley’nin “Frankenstein ya da Modern Prometheus” metninden ve diğer çeşitli örneklemlerden çıkardığım taktikler ile bu sefer de benzer şekilde yazılan mekânın –kentin- içinde canavar bedenleri ve canavar mekânları –canavarlaşan Tahtakale’nin içerisinde- arıyorum. İnsan bedeninin aslında çoktan bozulduğunu, nesnelerin ve ortamın da bedenle birlikte özneleştiğini, zaman kavramının sadece şu andan ibaret olmayıp geçmişin şimdinin üzerine yazılarak çoğaldığını sorgulayan canavarın ancak öznelerarası ve
zamanlararası ilişkisellikleri gözeterek yazılabileceğini düşünüyorum. Kentte, “iç”te yani “mahrem”de gizlenmiş olanı “dış”a taşıran özelliğiyle kamusal ve özel (mahrem) olan arasındaki ince çizginin oldukça kalınlaştığı; her ne kadar “dış”a “açılmış” görünse de “iç”e ait olanın beklenmedik ifşası ve şiddeti toplumsal cinsiyet kodlarını bedenlere dikte ederek onları yeni bir “iç”e “kapatmaya” zorlayan Tahtakale’nin sokaklarında tüm bu korkuları, merakları, kaçınılanları kendi varoluşunda barındıran ve bu çoklu kimlikleriyle özgürleşmeye çalışan politik-kültürel canavarı ortaya çıkaracak bir “yazma” denemesi ile bir metropol kentin canavarlarının neler olabileceğini araştırıyorum. Eğer ki canavar, mekâna birtakım taktikler aracılığıyla farklı pozisyonlardan yaklaşımlarla/ bakışlarla korkuyu bedenleştiriyor ise bu
bedenleşmenin ne kadar bedene ne kadar mekâna atfedileceği sorusu canavarın bedeninin sınırlarını aşıyor.

Bedenin materyalliği ile mekânın materyalliği arasındaki karşılıklı şiddetle yüzleşmek ve okuyanı yüzleştirmek için; “güçlü” olanın domine ettiği konvansiyonel tasarım pratiklerini “bozarak” yerine farklı şekillerde “yapma” yöntemleri öneren feminist eleştirel mekânsal pratiklerin içerisinde ben de canavar örneklemlerinden çıkardığım taktikler aracılığıyla metropol kentte yürüyerek bir “azınlık-oluş”/ “kadın-oluş” ile canavarları kolaj-metinler üreterek keşfediyorum. Böylece bu çalışma, mimari ve kentsel mekân üzerine düşünmenin - üretmenin yeni yollarını arayan; kadın bedeninin maruz kaldığı sınırlamaları, kimliği oluşturan temsilleri ve izleyicinin kendi cinsiyet önyargılarını kişiyle yüzleştirmeyi amaçlayan “tasarım pratikleri”; öğreten öğrenen ilişkisinin eridiği, hiyerarşik olmayan bir şekilde strüktüre edilmeye çalışılan, inisiyatif almaya ve birlikte “yapmaya” dayalı “pedagojik pratikler”; ideolojik olarak düzenlenen kamusal ve özel mekânın azınlık bedenlere uyguladığı sosyal, ekonomik ve politik şiddeti araştıran “tasarım araştırması pratikleri” ve mimar-işveren arasındaki güç ilişkilerini tersine çevirmeye çalışıp hiyerarşik olmayan koşullarda tasarlamayı amaçlayan “topluluk pratikleri” gibi alt başlıklarda tanımlanan ötekilik pratiklerine (altering practices) eklemlenip mekânı ikiliklerin, sınırların ve durağan bedenlerin - nesnelerin üzerinden tartışmanın yerine bu parçaları “canavar-oluş” ile çoğaltarak çoklu göçebe kimliklerin içinden tartışmanın aracı olabilir.

Understanding water issues as problemsheds addresses the narrowly water-centred framing of watershed and basin-focused water research and policy. In a critical realist approach problemshed also serves to identify the context-specificity of water knowledge, by navigating between the extremes of positivist generalization and interpretivist local specificity and bridging the divide between academic and applied research by identifying the structural similarity in their problem framing. Problemshed is operationalized by situating it in critical realism's structures-mechanisms-events ontology, and by drawing on realist evaluation's context-mechanism-outcome configurations. I use large-scale canal irrigation in India to illustrate how this is done.

This paper proposes situated data analysis as a new method for analysing social media platforms and digital apps. An analysis of the fitness tracking app Strava is used as a case study to develop and illustrate the method. Building upon Haraway's concept of situated knowledge and recent research on algorithmic bias, situated data analysis allows researchers to analyse how data is constructed, framed and processed for different audiences and purposes. Situated data analysis recognises that data is always partial and situated, and it gives scholars tools to analyse how it is situated, and what effects this may have. Situated data analysis examines representations of data, like data visualisations, which are meant for humans, and operations with data, which occur when personal or aggregate data is processed algorithmically by machines, for instance to predict behaviour patterns, adjust services or recommend content. The continuum between representational and operational uses of data is connected to different power relationships between platforms, users and society, ranging from normative disciplinary power and technologies of the self to environmental power, a concept that has begun to be developed in analyses of digital media as a power that is embedded in the environment, making certain actions easier or more difficult, and thus remaining external to the subject, in contrast to disciplinary power which is internalised. Situated data analysis can be applied to the aggregation, representation and oper-ationalization of personal data in social media platforms like Facebook or YouTube, or by companies like Google or Amazon, and gives researchers more nuanced tools for analysing power relationships between companies, platforms and users.

and Keywords Many Latin American theorists have addressed how and why to understand and engage with political thought produced in a different geographical and historical context and how to engage with abstract theoretical principles while also situating those principles within specific contexts. This chapter treats three particularly illustrative examples: Bartolomé de Las Casas, Simón Bolívar, and José Carlos Mariátegui. Writing in different periods and settings, and with distinct concerns, they vary in their degree of self-consciousness about and engagement with European political thought, yet all three engage with "Western" po­ litical thought strategically, selectively, and self-consciously to address localized problems and produce localized political results. Doing so showed the limits of the same European universalizing theories with which they engaged. All three thinkers illustrate the impor­ tance of situating political thought and of understanding how ideas settle in different con­ texts and can be put to different uses.