From climate change to COVID-19 to reproductive justice, there has been deep political polarization around science. Labs of Our Own provides a unique entry point into these twenty-first-century science wars by focusing on our affective relationships to science. The book delves into various sites where scientists, teachers, artists, and activists claim to create more democratic access to science—from DIY biology community labs to feminist classrooms to activist science practitioners. The reader will find that these claims for and attempts at democratic sciences not only impact what counts as science and who counts as a scientist but reconfigure who is included in the proper public. Instead of arguing for a knee-jerk defense of science against right-wing attacks, Labs of Our Own builds the case for a feminist, antiracist, decolonial, queer science tinkering practice that intentionally, politically, and ethically acts to produce new challenges to the definition and boundaries of the human.
"Recommended."
"With clarity and care, Giordano investigates how race, gender, sexuality, and capitalism position us in relationship to capitalist science while showing the multiplicity of sciences flourishing outside it in DIY lab spaces. Dwelling with 'tinkerers,' practitioners of science outside of capitalism’s well-funded labs, this book imagines the possibilities of a better, more just science in solidarity with Black, decolonial, and other feminisms."
"As students and academic workers speak out about university complicities in empire and accumulation, Sig Giordano's Labs of Our Own offers a heartfelt and street-smart pathway to the scientific works we need and the scientific cultures we need to leave behind. An essential read for teachers, scientists, tech workers, and anyone else who cares about how we make knowledge about our worlds."
Prelude: You’re Either with Us or against Us: Affective Dissonance and 9/11 Introduction Interlude 1: Serendipity Chapter 1: (De)constructing DIY Community Biology Labs Interlude 2: If We Knew What We Were Doing Chapter 2: The Tinkerer as a New Scientific Subject Interlude 3: Learning the Limits of Ethical Debate Chapter 3: Becoming the Informed Public Interlude 4: Nerd Masculinity Chapter 4: Feminist Labs of Our Own in Academia? Interlude 5: When the Right Comes to the Defense of Science Chapter 5: Toward Queer Sciences of Failure Interlude 6: Queer Revolt Chapter 6: Tinkering as a Feminist Praxis Epilogue Acknowledgments Notes References Index
SIG/SARA GIORDANO is an associate professor of interdisciplinary studies at Kennesaw State University in Georgia.
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