SUMMARY
Ethnography of infrastructures
What is ethnography? What makes something
ethnographic? The word ethnography comes from the Greek—ethnos means “folk/the
people” and grapho is “to write.” Ethnography is the writing of the people, the
writing of society, the writing of culture. Ethnographies have long been what
anthropologists write and read. Ethnography study of information system
implicitly involves the study of infrastructure
What is infrastructure Infrastructures are the systems that enable circulation of
goods, knowledge, meaning, people, and power. What can be studied is
always a relationship or infinite regress of relationship Never a “thing”
(Bateson, 1978, p.249)
Why an *ethnography* of objects? As well as the important studies of body
snatching, identity tourism, and trans global knowledge networks, let us also
attend ethnographically to the plugs, settings, sizes, and other profoundly
mundane aspects of cyberspace.
Susan Leigh Star’s, “The Ethnography of
Infrastructure”, she examines the intricacies of infrastructure and analyzes
them from an ethnographical perspective. She introduces her article with an
overview that prefaces each topic she addresses and makes a few important
points about the difficulties of studying infrastructure. According to her
studies, one must dig deeper and search more to realize that infrastructure is
not only about numbers and technical specifications. According to Webster’s
dictionary, infrastructure means “the basic physical and organizational
structures and facilities needed for the operation of a society or enterprise”.
Star believes that we should study this system ethnographically because even
though studying such things can be classified as “boring”, one can actually
surface many hidden details about how society works. She cites her and Bowker’s
analysis of how reading something as dry and boring. Ethnographic fieldwork
focuses attention on fringes and materialities of infrastructures and renders
the researcher able to read the invisible layers of control and access, to
understand the changes in the social orderings that are brought about by
information technology. Much of the ethnographic study of
infrastructure systems implicitly involves the study of infrastructure. The
studies of infrastructure involves technical jagran. There is need to study
what are the technical aspects that make the machine works, for example how do
water come in your home their has to be some sort of materials that helps to
come through the pipe line. This what we learn when we study infrastructure. Its easier to
understand the group process, talk communities, identity which are now
mediated by information technology there have been several studies done on
multiuser dungeons (MUDs), or virtual role-playing space, distance-mediated
identify, cyberspace communities but there has been less studies done on group
formation on several sites, the design of network or there fierce policy about
the domain name, exchange protocol, or language. There are much semi- private
setting that are buried in inacecesible electronic code. Susan star states to
that we should “study the unstudy” this way we would have accessibility and
understanding of things which are not possed by comman human. Its is some way
similer to studing boring things (infrastructure in this case)this will help us
to have understanding of high-tech workplace, home or school which are profoundly
impacted by the relatively unstudied infrastructure. We need to study the
reason behind for example if you study the whole city and neglect its sewers
and power supplies then you will miss out essential aspects of it. Generally people think infrastructure as a
system of subtracts – railroad lines, pipes and plumbing, electrical power
plants and wires but susan star define infrastructure as invisible, part of the
background for example turn on the faucet for drinking water and you may
use vast infrastructure of plumbing and
water regulations without even thinking about it. There are nine properties that gives us more depth in infrastructure:
Embeddedness – Infrastructure is sunk into and into
inside of structure.
Transparency- Infrastructure is transparent to use, in
a sense it does not have to be reinvented each time or assembled for each task.
Reach or scope-this may be either spatial or temporal
Learned as part of member ship- Those who are part of an community, the familiarty
of infrastructure is taken for granted. For stranger and outsider the target
object has to be learned, studied to become the part of community.
Links with conventions of practice – Infrastructure
both shapes and is shaped by conventions of community of practice.
Embodiment of standards – Standards are modified
according to the need of the user. However, some standards could cause problem
till the systems are learnt.
Built on an installed base- Infrastructure grows out of
a pre-established infrastructure. There is always a basis for every new Infrastructure.
Becomes visible upon breakdown- We try to build
invisible interfaces, but the moment a technology breaks down, it becomes
invisible, else, it is unobtrusive.
Is fixed in modular increments, not all once or globally-
Development of infrastructure is progressive phenomenon. It has develop over the
top of something existing.
There are
millions of tiny bridges built into large-scale information infrastructure and
millions of ( metaphoric) public buses that cannot pass through them. The example
of computer given to inner-city school and the developing world is an infamous
one. The computer may work fine, but the electricity is dirty and lacking. Old floppy
disks do not fit new drivers, and new disks are expensive. Local phone call are
not always free. New browsers are faster, but more memory hungry, and one of
now popular will not support the most popular web browser for blind people in
text –only format.
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