Forward From: Jens Kjærulff [mailto:[log in to unmask]] Sent: Thursday, November 15, 2001 9:52 PM
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Subject: SPOON-ANN: CFP - EASA workshop: ENGAGING (INFORMATION)
TECHNOLOGIES
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EASA workshop:
ENGAGING (INFORMATION) TECHNOLOGIES:
ANTHROPOLOGICAL OBJECTS AND (CON)TEXTS.
(Convened by Bryan Cleal and Jens Kjaerulff)
* * *
CALL FOR PAPERS:
The European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA) will launch its
bi-annual conference in Copenhagen, August 14 - 17 2002, on the general
theme:
'Engaging the World: Theoretical, Methodological and Political Challenges
for a 21st Century Anthropology'.
Within this general conference theme, a series of workshops will be
conducted with more narrowly focused topics. The workshop: 'ENGAGING
(INFORMATION) TECHNOLOGIES: ANTHROPOLOGICAL OBJECTS AND (CON)TEXTS' is
scheduled as one of these and, as the conveners, we would like to invite
submission of papers addressing themes relating to the focus of this
workshop as indicated in the abstract below.
Deadline for submission of paper proposals is February 15th 2002. Paper
abstracts should be 150-200 words (in English). Further details on
submission of papers follow below the workshop abstract. Thank you for
considering this invitation. Please feel free to forward it to others whom
you think may be interested, or to use the attached rtf document with a
formatted version of the text for your local bulletin board.
Best regards,
Bryan Cleal and Jens Kjaerulff
* * *
ENGAGING (INFORMATION) TECHNOLOGIES:
ANTHROPOLOGICAL OBJECTS AND (CON)TEXTS.
'Information technology' (IT) has come to designate a range of artefacts
and associated conceptual constructs with which we increasingly are
'engaging the world'. The purposely ambiguous title of this workshop
signals our simultaneous interest in issues arising from IT as material and
conceptual 'technologies' of engagement, and in possibilities and
challenges that these present in terms of anthropological methods as
'technologies' of research.
While the workshop's theme is purposely stated in broad terms, we indicate
a few more specific lines of inquiry:
Purposeful schemes and applications of related material objects have always
been integral to human lives and, in this respect, anthropology has always
been
concerned with technologies and their engagements. Yet engagement may be
experienced as encroachment; a point that applies to both material and
methodological considerations.
IT appears as the material foundation for a new form of social organization
(e.g. the Network Society) and therein creates 'auto-contexts' through
which it may be rendered comprehensible. Whether and how social
anthropology can or should work with or around these contexts is one
question we hope to address.
Context is also crucial to the related theme of methodological encroachment
where other fields of study, such as 'science and technology studies' or
'systems development' appear to engage with traditional anthropological
objects, whilst also adopting and applying 'ethnography' as their method.
Here ethnography is seen less as an integral part of a disciplinary
tradition and more as a way of obtaining reliable results. This has its
merits but is it a viable aim for anthropological ethnography to seek
results in an instrumental way? More pertinently, perhaps, given that
technology and ethnography are already well acquainted, is it viable for
anthropologists to engage with IT in a way that is not instrumental?
* * *
FURTHER DETAILS REGARDING SUBMISSION OF PAPERS, AND THE CONFERENCE IN
GENERAL:
Paper submissions should include full contact details, particularly email
addresses of the proposer(s). Proposals should be submitted to one, or both
of the conveners:
Bryan Cleal
(Centre for Human-Machine Interaction, Risoe National
Laboratory, Denmark)
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
Jens Kjaerulff
(Department of Ethnography and Social Anthropology
University of Aarhus, Denmark)
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
While deadline for submission of paper proposals is February 15th 2002, you
should contact us as soon as possible with an abstract if you would like to
propose a paper.
In accordance with EASA guidelines, it is up to workshop conveners to
select papers that will make a coherent workshop session. The selected
papers with their abstract will be gathered together in a booklet available
to the conference participants.
When you submit your final paper proposal by February 15th 2002, please
indicate if you plan to use special equipment for your paper presentation,
such as of overhead projector, slide projector, video monitor, power-point
monitor, or the like, so that we can ensure access to these facilities
during the workshop.
Further general information about the conference will be available in EASA
newsletters (distributed to members), and on the EASA website:
http://www.ub.es/easa/menu.htm
NOTE ON SUBSIDIES:
Scholars wishing to participate in the Conference, who are traveling from
Eastern European or Third World destinations may be eligible for funding
from the Wenner-Gren Foundation. If you are a proposing a paper and would
like to be considered for funding, please contact Jon Mitchell as soon as
possible.
Applications will not be considered after 27th November.
Jon P. Mitchell
CCS University of Sussex
Essex House Falmer
Brighton BN1 9RQ UK
tel: 1273 606755 x 2565
fax: 1273 678644
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