The Mangle in Practice

Science, Society, and Becoming

Author: Pickering, Andrew; Guzik, Keith; Smith, Barbara Herrnstein; Weintraub, E. Roy; Franklin, Adrian
Publisher: Duke University Press
Serie: Science and Cultural Theory
ISBN: 9780822343516
eISBN Pdf: 9780822390107
Place of publication: Durham , United States
Year of digital publication: 2009
Month: January
Pages: 320
DDC: 501
Language: English

Caption

In The Mangle of Practice (1995), the renowned sociologist of science Andrew Pickering argued for a reconceptualization of research practice as a “mangle,” an open-ended, evolutionary, and performative interplay of human and non-human agency. While Pickering’s ideas originated in science and technology studies, this collection aims to extend the mangle’s reach by exploring its application across a wide range of fields including history, philosophy, sociology, geography, environmental studies, literary theory, biophysics, and software engineering.

The Mangle in Practice opens with a fresh introduction to the mangle by Pickering. Several contributors then present empirical studies that demonstrate the mangle’s applicability to topics as diverse as pig farming, Chinese medicine, economic theory, and domestic-violence policing. Other contributors offer examples of the mangle in action: real-world practices that implement a self-consciously “mangle-ish” stance in environmental management and software development. Further essays discuss the mangle as philosophy and social theory. As Pickering argues in the preface, the mangle points to a shift in interpretive sensibilities that makes visible a world of de-centered becoming. This volume demonstrates the viability, coherence, and promise of such a shift, not only in science and technology studies, but in the social sciences and humanities more generally.

Contributors: Lisa Asplen, Dawn Coppin, Adrian Franklin, Keith Guzik, Casper Bruun Jensen,Yiannis Koutalos, Brian Marick, Randi Markussen, Andrew Pickering, Volker Scheid, Esther-Mirjam Sent, Carol Steiner, Maxim Waldstein

Contents
Preface
New Ontologies
Part One: Studies
- A Choreography of Fire: A Posthumanist Account of Australians and Eucalypts
- Crate and Mangle: Questions of Agency in Confinement Livestock Facilities
- Soul Collectors: A Meditation on Arresting Domestic Violence
- Resisting and Accommodating Thomas Sargent: Putting Rational Expectations Economics through the Mangle of Practice
- The Mangle of Practice and the Practice of Chinese Medicine: A Case Study from Nineteenth-Century China
- Marup Church and the Politics of Hybridization: On Choice and Becoming
Part Two: Reflexivity
- Going with the Flow: Living the Mangle through Environmental Management Practice
- A Manglish Way of Working: Agile Software Development
- The Docile Body of the Scientist
Part Three: Theory
- The Mangle of Practice or the Empire of Signs: Toward a Dialogue between Science Studies and Soviet Semiotics
- Ontological Dance: A Dialogue between Heidegger and Pickering
References
About the Contributors
Index