General Course Requirements

During the Spring semester 2007, this course will meet on Tuesday afternoons from 4.00 to 6.30pm.  The general approach will be the reading and discussion of a series of basic works in the STS studies field.

More Specific Class Mechanics

The class will be conducted as a proseminar.  We are all students of the arguments of the scholars we are reading, and we will all be trying to give their writings the most sympathetic and insightful interpretations we can.

For each class meeting, all students will be required to turn in a brief, one-page response paper on one of the assigned readings.  For each class meeting, at least one student will be required to make a presentation on an assigned reading.

All students are expected to participate actively in class discussions.

Some kind of publication should come out of this course, most probably a book review.

There will be a final exam.

Final grading arrangements will be established by class negotiation.

Required Texts

I do not yet know which of the six books I ordered (see list below) are available in the bookstore.   This information will be provided in the next class, and on the basis of this information, I will develop a final draft schedule for the seminar.

1. Stephen H. Cutcliffe and Carl Mitcham, eds., Visions of STS: Counterpoints in Science, Technology, and Society Studies
   Albany: SUNY Press, 2001
   ISBN 0-7914-4846-0
2. John Dewey, The Public and Its Problems
   Swallow Press [or any other readily available edition]
3. Bruno Latour, We Have Never Been Modern
   Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press, 1993
   ISBN 0-674-94839-4
4. Jerome Ravetz, The No-Nonsense Guide to Science
   Oxford: New International Publication, 2005
   ISBN 1-896357-98-9
5. Sergio Sismondo, An Introduction to Science and Technology Studies
   Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2005
   ISBN 978-0-631-23444-9
6. Sharon Traweek, Beamtimes and Lifetimes: The World of High Energy Physicists
   Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988
   ISBN 0-674-06348-1