IN4MATX 161: SOCIAL ANALYSIS OF COMPUTERIZATION

Transcription

1 IN4MATX 161: SOCIAL ANALYSIS OF COMPUTERIZATION Lecture 3: Social aspects of technical questions 1 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

2 ANNOUNCEMENTS Readings now on EEE Less content - more dialogue Last day to drop - TODAY Mandatory discussion - GROUP 1 2 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

3 QUESTIONS? Group Project and Final Paper 3 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

4 READING SUMMARIES 1. What is the author attempting to describe/argue? 2. What do you think the author is most concerned about regarding this issue? OR What are you most concerned about regarding this issue? 3. What do you think the author is most optimistic about regarding this issue? OR What are you most optimistic about regarding this issue? 4 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

5 WHAT IS TECHNOLOGY? 5 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

6 WHAT IS TECHNOLOGY? Tool Technique Way of doing Way of seeing Way of knowing/framing 6 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

7 WHAT IS A TECHNOPHILE? 7 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

8 POSTMAN Thesis: 8 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

9 POSTMAN Thesis: New technologies change everything Ecological change Shift in structure - what we think about New and modified symbols - what we think with 9 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

10 POSTMAN Thesis: New technologies are both a burden and a blessing Not just between haves and have nots Short term / long term Different aspects of life Competing goals 10 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

11 POSTMAN Implicit assumptions: 11 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

12 POSTMAN Implicit assumptions: Technology does - agentic perspective Uses made of any technology largely determined by the structure of the tool itself. pg 7 Tendency to present things as black/white Who is the master. Will we control it. Will it control us? pg. 142 Assume we have the capacity to delineate and pinpoint value - and that value is static and universal. Statistics buries in a heap of trivia what is necessary to know. pg In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

13 POSTMAN Concern: 13 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

14 POSTMAN Concern: Not asking the right questions No focus on training for new tools. Not addressing what tools enable what value. Not acknowledging shifts in power that accompany new monopolies of language. 14 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

15 POSTMAN Concern: Not asking the right questions. What are the right questions???? 15 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

16 POSTMAN Concern: Evolution of how we define concepts becomes invisible, masked, normalized Issue - Fair mechanism to allocate money to education. High standards and measurable goals - lead to individual outcomes Solution - No child left behind act. Result - Money to schools. Improved test scores. Question - How does this solution affect definitions of education, access, and equity? Assumption: Measurable outcomes measure what we feel students should learn. Assumption: Tests are testing all students the same - no systematic bias. Testing is a technology 16 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

17 POSTMAN Concern: Evolution of how we define concepts becomes invisible, masked, normalized Family Feud exercise - what do you know about how old your classmates were when they got their first computer? 17 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

18 POSTMAN Concern: Evolution of how we define concepts becomes invisible, masked, normalized Family Feud exercise - what do you know about how old your classmates were when they got their first computer? Guesses provided in class: 11 and 12 Most common answer: 12 (9 of 47 responses). No answers for 11 Average: 13.1 Range: 6-20 How did people interpret the question? 18 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

19 POSTMAN Concern: Evolving technologies evolving definitions of old words 19 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

20 POSTMAN Concern: Evolving technologies evolving definitions of old words Examples: Friend Harness Connected 20 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

21 POSTMAN Concern: Evolving technologies evolving ideologies Technologies change what we mean by knowledge and truth; thy alter those deeply embedded habits of thought that give to a culture its sense of what the world is like -- a sense of what is the natural order of things, of what is reasonable, of what is necessary, of what is inevitable, of what is real. pg. 12 Technologies (questions, computers, television, stethescopes, lie detectors) are mechanisms that give direction to our thoughts, generate new ideas, venerate old ones, expose facts, or hide them. 127 Ideology is a set of assumptions of which we are barely conscious but nonetheless directs our efforts to give shape and coherence to the world. pg In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

22 POSTMAN Concern: Evolving technologies evolving ideologies Example: Databases 22 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

23 SHIRKEY Thesis: 23 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

24 SHIRKEY Thesis: The pivotal technologies of today become meaningful for society because they affect how we form groups New kinds of groups Overhead of forming groups Access to each other (innate sociability) Access to information 24 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

25 SHIRKEY Implicit assumptions: 25 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

26 SHIRKEY Implicit assumptions: We are innately social creatures We gravitate to all forms of sociability Groups have similar properties regardless of form Groups without centralized coordination still function as groups We have enough attention and motivation to join emerging groups 26 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

27 SHIRKEY What did you think about the story of Ivanna, Evan and Sasha? 27 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

28 SHIRKEY What did you think about the story of Ivanna, Evan and Sasha? Visibility into each other's lives What are we able to see/not see? Power dynamics Between individuals. Between individuals and institutions. Official relations. Backchannel relations. Ownership Material good, personal information Attention economy What kind of stories get that kind of attention? Why? Possible to anticipate? Possible to harness? 28 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

29 SHIRKEY What did you think about the story of Ivanna, Evan and Sasha? Technologies as ways of doing, ways of seeing? New ideologies illuminated by this anecdote? 29 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

30 SAREWITZ Thesis: 30 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

31 SAREWITZ Thesis: Socio-technical systems emerge in relation to ways of thinking (ideologies). Socio-technical systems provide new ways of seeing that recursively affect ways of thinking Make some things visible. Some things invisible. Socio-technical systems enable coordination around abstract goals. 31 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

32 SAREWITZ Implicit assumptions: 32 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

33 SAREWITZ Implicit assumptions: Socio-Technical systems are not vehicles for addressing deeper human needs. What becomes invisible in socio-technical systems is important. Operating within a socio-technical system focuses people such that they rarely think about larger questions of human value. If people did they might find a way to act, think, see differently. 33 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

34 SAREWITZ Are you happy? What are the human needs that Sarewitz refers to? 34 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

35 SAREWITZ Are you happy? What are the human needs that Sarewitz refers to? How do the ideologies discussed today relate to these human needs? How do you think that the current ecology of technologies and socio-technical systems relate to those needs? 35 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

36 QUESTIONS? 36 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

37 NEXT CLASS Thursday 4/8: IT for Development Guest Lecturer - Nithya Sambsivan 37 In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian

38 READINGS ONLY week in the quarter with readings assigned for both Tuesday and Thursday Rikin Gandhi, Rajesh Veeraraghavan, Kentaro Toyama, Vanaja Ramprasad. Digital Green: Participatory Video for Agricultural Extension, ICTD 2007, Bangalore, India. December 15-16, 2007 Eric Brewer, Michael Demmer, Bowei Du, Kevin Fall, Melissa Ho, Matthew Kam, Sergiu Nedevschi, Joyojeet Pal, Rabin Patra, and Sonesh Surana. The Case for Technology for Developing Regions. IEEE Computer. Volume 38, Number 6, pp , June In4Max 161: Spring Mazmanian