Angela Okune Annotations

NANO: (How) is “Africa” invoked when the author discusses data (as a place with unique demands or responsibilities, for example)?

Monday, August 6, 2018 - 1:09pm

Tilley is thinking about the legacy of colonialism and how it shaped the role of science on the continent.

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TECHNO: (How) does the analyst account for the data practices and responsibilities of the people and organizations studied?

Monday, August 6, 2018 - 1:09pm

Working in the 19th and 20th centuries, Tilley largely thinks about the “technologies” at the time (increased travel around the global, science fairs and events, etc.) that brought about greater cross-cultural interpenetration. She does not talk explicitly about the data practices.

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MACRO: (How) are economic and legal infrastructures said to shape science and technology in Africa?

Monday, August 6, 2018 - 1:07pm

The growth of science on the continent was linked to the growth of colonialism. Simultaneously the “organization of international science congresses and networks, which established shared nomenclature and methods within disciplines and across nations; the professionalization of the bio- sciences and field sciences—such as geology, geography, evolution, archaeology, pale- ontology, zoology, botany, and anthropology—which took the earth and its inhabitants as their object of study; the inauguration of world fairs and science museums and their attendant exhibits comparing accomplishments in different parts of the globe and among different peoples; the development of international communication systems that allowed much more rapid circulation of scientific journals and correspondence; and the standard- ization and proliferation of national and international laws regulating, and therefore also defining, science, medicine, and technology (including and especially patent laws). It was through these imperial and transnational pathways that scientific communities began to achieve a critical mass and sufficient professional power to enable them both to think and to act in planetary terms, a process that continues to this day.” (113)

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DEUTERO: How is this analyst denoting and worrying about “Africa”?

Monday, August 6, 2018 - 1:07pm

This analyst is thinking about “Africa” largely by its geographic boundaries and especially thinking about how to talk about translations between different knowledges on the continent. She is particularly looking at how “primitive knowledges” were constructed and how the parameters for its study were often defined explicitly in scientific terms.

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DISCURSIVE RISKS: What are the analyst’s epistemic assumptions of “Africa”?

Monday, August 6, 2018 - 1:07pm

The analyst is focused on a macro level analysis of the legal and political infrastructures esablished by the colonial project in Africa that also set in motion the scientific infrastructures. She is focused on understanding the translation of “primitive knowledges” and how those were framed in scientific logics. She mentions some of the tech but does not look at practice or data specifically.

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TEXT: Is this artifact openly accessible without cost?

Monday, August 6, 2018 - 1:06pm

Yes. The analyst (?) appears to have uploaded it to her university site where it is available for download. I am not sure if the article is originally published behind a paywall.

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MICRO: What did the analyst choose to describe as “science” and/or “data” in Africa?

Monday, August 6, 2018 - 1:05pm

Tilley argues that historians need to pay much closer attention to the changing and porous boundaries that have existed between science and non-science during rapid and extended moments of cross-cultural interpenetration given that philosophers of science have shown that “there is no singular knowledge system that can be grouped under the label “science” and that within the myriad sciences there are often competing and incommensurable epistemologies” (117)

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