Workshop "Community and Identity in Contemporary Techno-Sciences"

Concept and organization: Karen Kastenhofer (Austrian Academy of Sciences), Martina Merz (Univ. Klagenfurt), Ulrike Felt, Maximilian Fochler, Anna Pichelstorfer (Univ. Vienna), Niki Vermeulen (Univ. Edinburgh)

Sponsored by STS Austria together with EASST, Univ. Klagenfurt, Univ. Vienna, ITA/ÖAW and FWF

“We look with our own eyes, we see with the eyes of a collective body” – With these words the physician/biologist turned philosopher of science, Ludwik Fleck, pointedly summarized the relation between the individual mind and a related thought collective some 70 years ago. This relation has ever since been an inspiring starting point to reflect upon the conditions of doing and being in science, from the coining of the concepts of scientific community and epistemic cultures to the analyses of academic socialisation processes and the emergence of new specialties. But not only did our theoretical conceptions evolve, so did the empirical situation within the scientific world, a change hinted at by some scholars with the new label of ‘technoscience’. The first workshop launched by STS Austria addresses the thesis that it is not only that individual communities and identities emerge and fade away over time; we also observe changes in the general organisation and relevance of community and identity.