Entangled Data: Knowledge and Community Making in e- (Social) Science

Principal Investigator - Dr Ben Anderson

Co-Principal Investigator - Dr Dawn Nafus

Start Date - January 2005 Now completed

Duration - 12 months

Location - University of Essex

Website - http://www.essex.ac.uk/chimera/projects/edkm/

This project has conducted a comparative study to understand how and why groups of research scientists do or do not collaborate using shared digital data sources. It developed insights into the likely use and non-use of e-science technologies, and the social and technological innovations that may be required as e-science expands from its early adopters. It did this by tracing the ways in which data travels across geographically distributed networks of researchers, and analysing the concepts of 'community' that are involved in making data travel. This has contributed to our wider understanding of academic knowledge production and disciplinarity. The anthropology of science was used as well as anthropological theories of exchange to shed light on the nature of these relationships whilst Computer Supported Collaborative Work (CSCW) has provided an ongoing commentary on the support of everyday work practices with technology.

Four cases of ICT-based data sharing practices were examined, one in the physical sciences and three in the social sciences. One group are already using e-science technology to collaborate and share data, but are in the early stages of infrastructure and application design. The second group is longer standing, but analyses data complex enough to ask questions about both cultures of interpretation as well as grid-enabled possibilities. The final groups use a mix of technologies, and works primarily with visual data.

The project analysed the social circumstances of these groups that make it sensible to share data (or not), by comparing discourses about sharing with actual sharing practices. Through the project workshop, the case study results have been translated into ideas for grid engineering projects and have fed insights into the e-science community.

Presentations

e-Enabling Data: Potential impacts on methods and expertise
S. Carlson, B. Anderson, University of Essex
2nd International Conference on e-Social Science, Manchester, 28 ¨C 30 June 2006

Presentation

Publications

e-Enabling Data: Potential impacts on methods and expertise
S. Carlson, B. Anderson, University of Essex
Published in the Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on e-Social Science, Manchester, 28 - 30 June 2006

Paper

ESRC End of Award Report

ESRC Non-technical Summary