Science, Technology and Society

Study Board of Business Economics

Teaching language: English
EKA: B150138102
Censorship: Second examiner: None
Grading: 7-point grading scale
Offered in: Odense
Offered in: Autumn
Level: Master

Course ID: B150138101
ECTS value: 10

Date of Approval: 05-04-2019


Duration: 1 semester

Course ID

B150138101

Course Title

Science, Technology and Society

Teaching language

English

ECTS value

10

Responsible study board

Study Board of Business Economics

Date of Approval

05-04-2019

Course Responsible

Name Email Department
Dorthe Brogård Kristensen dbk@sam.sdu.dk

Offered in

Odense

Level

Master

Offered in

Autumn

Duration

1 semester

Mandatory prerequisites

-

Recommended prerequisites

-

Aim and purpose

The purpose of this seminar is to provide the students with an anthropologically based understanding of technological development, focusing on the relationship between innovation, social change and consumption practices and reflecting on the managerial consequences of these relationships. The course covers issues that include: ethnographic practices in innovation, design and corporate culture, ways that people and technologies co-construct everyday conditions and futures, the role of technologies in mediating relationships between citizens, corporations and the state; and the Internet of Things as a new realm of social relationality. Overall the course equips the student with knowledge and competences in order to manage processes involving technology and customer – experience interplay and to use market ethnographic knowledge for designing and evaluating human-technology interaction. These competences are applicable in a large range of service and welfare contexts.

In the face of globalization and its challenge to community-based studies of cultural processes, anthropology has become increasingly interested in innovation and technologies. In order to tackle the notion of cultural complexities and organizational dynamics, students are presented to the use of ethnography and anthropology in the study and design of devices, products, services and infrastructure. The course will deal with technologies in the following ways;  
1) technologies used on an individual level a) social media, algorithm and personal analytics (when people measure, track and monitor themselves)  personal interest: analog versus digital medias & materialities.
2). Technical systems such as communications networks, energy infrastructure, roads, and water and waste systems, that have become sites for conducting ethnographies of contemporary development, stakeholder networks, projects and relationships.  
3). Robots such as drones and welfare technologies. 


Content

  • Theories of organizational culture and technology
  • Theories and applied cases of innovation and design anthropology Information
  • Technologies and Social Life
  • Technological Infrastructure and culture.

Description of outcome - Knowledge

• Demonstrate that they possess the required knowledge by being able to: 
• Explain the contribution of anthropology to the analysis of technology-culture-business relationships 
• Explain the cultural principles and methods used in the development of a specific technology.

Description of outcome - Skills

Demonstrate that they have skills to analyze and assess a specific technological content 
• Analyse the theoretical relationships and interconnectivity between technologies, culture and human practices 
• Investigate and analyze the drivers and barriers surrounding technological innovation and development, in particular their cultural dimensions 
• Be able to detect cultural patterns behind data analytics and apply this insight for strategic decision making 
• Undertake analysis of the ethical issues at stake • Critically reflect on technological innovation in a societal framework 

Description of outcome - Competences

• Based on the analysis of given technology to bring input to the developers to decision. 
• Reflect on how models and theories of the technologies can be involved to support decisions in a welfare context.     

Literature

For example:
• Hyysalo, Sampsa Torben Elgaard Jensen and Nelly Oudshoorn (2016) The New Production of Users Changing innovation collectives and Involvement strategies. New York: Routledge. 
• Verbeek. Paul (2011) Moralising technology, Understanding and Designing the Morality of things. London: University of Chicago press.  
• Ruckenstein, Minna 2014. Visualized and Interacted Life: Personal Analytics and Engagements with Data Doubles. Societies 4(1):68–84. 
• Taina Bucher (2017) The algorithmic imaginary: exploring the ordinary affects of Facebook algorithms, Information, Communication & Society, 20:1, 30-44. 
• Von Schnitzler, Antina. 2013. Travelling Technologies. Infrastructure, Ethical Regimes, and the Materiality of Politics in South Africa. Cultural Anthropology 28 (4): 670-693.   Larkin, Brian. Signal and noise: media, infrastructure, and urban culture in Nigeria. Duke University Press, 2008.    
• Kristin Asdal, Brita Brenna and Ingunn Moser (eds.) (2007) & Technoscience. The Politics of Interventions. Oslo: Oslo University Press.  

Teaching Method

Seminar carried out as roundtable discussions between students and teacher. Furthermore students are expected to do an oral presentation of 1) readings that relate to the themes in the course and their own individual research project 2) their own projects  

If more than 20 students  enrolled in the course , the format of the teaching will be changed to lectures. 

Workload

Scheduled classes:
16 seminars of 2 hours 
Workload: Participation in seminars 32 hours 
Independent work on research paper 238 hours. 

Examination regulations

Exam

Name

Exam

Timing

Exam: January
Reexam: February

Examination form may be altered for the reexamination, eg. from written to oral examination.

Tests

Exam

Name

Exam

Form of examination

Take-home assignment

Censorship

Second examiner: None

Grading

7-point grading scale

Identification

Student Identification Card - Exam number

Language

English

Duration

Date for submission will appear from the examination plan.

Length

20 standard pages excl. Appendices.

Examination aids

Aids allowed: All exam aids allowed.  

Assignment handover

Not relevant.

Assignment handin

Via SDU-assignment in the course page in Blackboard.

ECTS value

10

Additional information

The student’s achievement of the learning goals will be assessed through a written report that will be prepared based on the student’s independent research and incorporate data collected during the semester. Such materials may be appended to the 25 page body of the report. The report should conform to standard research paper formats.  

Supplemental information on reexam:

An improved research paper. A short supervision is granted in the form of an explanation of major weaknesses in the original paper.

EKA

B150138102

External comment

NOTE - This course is identical with the former course B150027101 Anthropology of Business and Technology.
Used examination attempts in the former identical course will be transferred.
Courses that are identical with former courses that are passed according to applied rules cannot be retaken.

The student is automatically registered for the first examination attempt when the student is registered for a course or course element with which one or more examinations are associated. Withdrawal of registration is not possible, and students who fail to participate in an examination have used one examination attempt, unless the University has made an exemption due to special circumstances. 

Courses offered

Offer period Offer type Profile Education Semester

Teachers

Name Email Department City
Dorthe Brogård Kristensen dbk@sam.sdu.dk Odense
Konstantinos Lianidis kostas@sam.sdu.dk Odense

URL for Skemaplan