Day Eleven: Boundary Work
SDS 237: Data Ethnography
Lindsay Poirier
Draw a “map of data science” - sort of like you would draw a map of the world. What’s at the center of your map? What features are at the periphery? What are the far-off lands outside of its borders? Where are the mountains? Rivers? Forbidden areas?
Turn to a neighbor and discuss:
- How does your map reflect certain assumptions of what counts as data science vs. non-data-science?
Reading Discussion
Boundary Work
- Examines the work that society does to set the boundaries of science vs. non-science
- Acknowledges that differently situated people have different ways of justifying what makes something scientific vs. non-scientific
- Helps establish science’s epistemic authority through credibility contests and cartographic contrast
How do we decide what is pseudo-science?
Positioning Data Science on the Map
- Where we place data science in relation to other disciplines matters
- Does data science sit separately from domains? Does it sit outside them? Above them? What does this convey about data science?
> A diagram showing the intersection of many areas involved in T-TRIPODS. Illustration: Yulia Dumov