This course provides a strong foundation for graduate work in STS, a multidisciplinary field with a signature capacity to rethink the relationship among science, technology, and political and social life. From climate change to population genomics, access to medicines and the impact of new media, the problems of our time are simultaneously scientific and social, technological and political, ethical and economic.

This seminar is designed to provide a rigorous foundation in the interdisciplinary field of Science and Technology Studies (STS). This course provides a strong foundation for graduate work in STS, a multidisciplinary field with a signature capacity to rethink the relationship among science, technology, and political and social life. The course will proceed in two parts. In the first half of the course, we’ll discuss the emergence of major themes and issues in the field and assess strengths and weaknesses of leading theories and research methodologies. We’ll explore the relationship between science, technology, culture, and politics through exemplary case-studies from different periods and contexts. In the second half of the course, we will think about these problems on the grounds of terms and disciplinary foci that have come to the forefront of our field(s). From climate change to population genomics, access to medicines and the impact of new media, the problems of our time are simultaneously scientific and social, technological and political, ethical and economic. This reading seminar is a required core course for the Designated Emphasis in Science and Technology Studies (DE in STS).

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