The Anthropogenic: Situating the Human in the Natural Sciences - YMSKE514

• Title: The Anthropogenic: Situating the Human in the Natural Sciences
• Guaranteed by: Programme Social and Cultural Ecology (24-KSKE)
• Faculty: Faculty of Humanities
• Actual: from 2023
• Semester: summer
• E-Credits: 3
• Examination process: summer s.:
• Hours per week, examination: summer s.:0/2, C [HT]
• Capacity: unknown / 20 (20)
• Min. number of students: unlimited
• 4EU+: no
• Virtual mobility / capacity: no
• State of the course: taught
• Language: English
• Teaching methods: full-time
• Teaching methods: full-time
• Note: course can be enrolled in outside the study plan; enabled for web enrollment; priority enrollment if the course is part of the study plan
• Guarantor: Mgr. Bohuslav Kuřík, Ph.D.; Markus Rudolfi, M.A.
• Teacher(s): Mgr. Bohuslav Kuřík, Ph.D.; Markus Rudolfi, M.A.
• Class: Courses available to incoming students

Annotation

English

Last update: Mgr. Tomáš Mašek (13.12.2023)

This course is designed as a research-oriented reading exercise where we engage with selected texts from the environmental sciences as empirical material. It is interdisciplinary in its general orientation and should provide participants with skills in reading and working in inter- and transdisciplinary fields. It introduces to literature from Science and Technology Studies (STS), environmental sociology, ethnographic and ethnomethodological approaches, and studies on interdisciplinarity.

Czech

Last update: Mgr. Tomáš Mašek (13.12.2023)

Tento kurz je koncipován jako badatelsky orientovaná četba, při níž se budeme zabývat vybranými texty z oblasti environmentálních věd. Je interdisciplinárně zaměřen a měl by pomoci posluchačům zlepšit dovednosti v oblasti čtení inter- a transdisciplinárních textů. Seznámí posluchače s literaturou z oblasti Science and Technology Studies (STS), sociologie životního prostředí, etnografických a etnometodologických studií.

Aim of the course

Last update: Mgr. Tomáš Mašek (13.12.2023)

To describe human influences on the natural environment, scientists often use the term “anthropogenic”. The term was used even before the Anthropocene became a possible frame of our current epoch. Today, we use the “anthropogenic” as an indicator for the Anthropocene and when distinctions between “natural” and “human” impacts matter. For instance, C02 in the atmosphere is not always human-made (think of volcanic eruptions or natural wildfires) and demands scientists to integrate the possibility of either human or natural emissions. The distinction itself becomes a difficult task.

Following the “anthropogenic” through its various conceptualisations in selected scientific disciplines, this seminar asks how the human, as one factor among others, poses “chronic empirical difficulties” (Syre 2012) in environmental research. Guiding questions of this seminar are: How is “the human” integrated and situated in natural and environmental science research? How do inter- and transdisciplinary studies deal with heterogeneous concepts of “the human”? What role can or must social sciences play in the study of the “anthropogenic”?

Syllabus

Last update: Mgr. Tomáš Mašek (13.12.2023)

Day 1:
Required reading:

Moore, J. W. (2023): Our Capitalogenic World: Climate Crises, Class Politics, and the Civilizing Project. Annales Universitatis Paedagogicae Cracoviensis. Studia Poetica, 11, 97-122.

Hirsch, S. L., Ribes, D., & Inman, S. (2022): Sedimentary legacy and the disturbing recurrence of the human in long-term ecological research. Social Studies of Science, 52(4), 561-580.

Optional reading:

Markham, A.N. (2013): Undermining ‘data’: A critical examination of a core term in scientific inquiry. First Monday, 18 (10); URL: click here

Day 2
Required reading:

Law, J. (2002): Objects. In: ibid., Aircraft Stories: Decentering the Object in Technoscience, London and Durham: Duke University Press, pp. 12-37.

Myers, G. (1990): Controversies about Scientific Texts (Chapter 1). In: ibid., Writing Biology: Texts in the Social Construction of Scientific Knowledge. London and Madison, WI: The University of Wisconsin Press, pp. 3-40.

Optional reading:

Ginzburg, C. (1992): Clues: Roots of an Evidential Paradigm. In: ibid., Clues, Myths, and the Historical Method. Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, pp. 96-125.

Day 3
Required reading:

Latour, B. (1993): Pasteur on Lactic Acid Yeast: A Partial Semiotic Analysis. Configurations, 1(1), pp. 129-146.

Selected readings:

Ballestero, A. & Winthereik, B.R. (eds., 2021): Experimenting with Ethnography: A Companion to Analysis. Durham, London: Duke University Press. URL:

Day 4
Selected readings:

Becker, H.S. (2007): Telling About Society. Chicago, London: University of Chicago Press.

Course completion requirements

Last update: Mgr. Tomáš Mašek (15.12.2023)

The requirements for the successful completion of the course include regular attendance, the analysis of a self-chosen scientific text, as well as the presentation of preliminary results on the case study.