Susan Leigh Star

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Susan Leigh Star (born July 3, 1954 ; died March 24, 2010 ) was an American sociologist who studied the importance of information in modern societies and questions of standardization . She mostly used qualitative methods and fell back on feminist theories.

biography

Star was born as Susan Leigh Kippax . Your last name Star is self-chosen. She grew up in a rural, industrial area of Rhode Island . After receiving a scholarship to Radcliffe College , she began studying philosophy there. Star dropped out, married, and moved to Venezuela , where she co-founded a commune . It was during this time that Star began to grapple with questions about technology and its implications. Since the late 1970s, she has combined the Wicca religion and feminist-ecological views.

Star returned to college and graduated Magna cum laude in Psychology and Social Relations from Radcliffe College in 1976 . She did her PhD in 1983 with Anselm Strauss (title: Scientific Theories as Going Concerns , published as Regions of the Mind ).

Star was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Information and Computer Science at UC Irvine from 1987 to 1990 . She then worked in Paris and in the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology at the University of Keele . 1992–1999 Star worked at the University of Illinois, then until 2004 at the University of California, San Diego , followed by work at Santa Clara University . In 2009, Star was appointed to the Doreen E. Boyce Chair in Library and Information Services at the University of Pittsburgh .

Star was married to the science philosopher and historian Geoffrey Bowker , with whom she also researched and published together.

Susan Leigh Star died unexpectedly on March 24, 2010 at the age of 55.

Academic work

Star's work was influenced by symbolic interactionism and American pragmatism . She used grounded theory as a research method and saw it as an important influence on her life. A recurring theme in her work was how groups deal with heterogeneous infrastructures. In the study of actor relationships , Star emphasized "many-to-many relationships" in an advancement of Latour and Callon's theories .

With the boundary objects ( Boundary Objects imaginary) star and Griesemer says that can work together as different groups with different objectives, a concept. Her interest in infrastructures for cooperation can also be found in her work on computer systems for cooperation , such as: B. in Steps towards an ecology of infrastructure . She analyzes categorization and standards as well as their social effects in Sorting Things Out , in publications on the visibility of work and gender in brain research.

Fonts (selection)

  • Susan Leigh Star: Frontier Objects and Media Research . Ed .: Sebastian Gießmann, Nadine Taha. 1st edition. Transcript, Bielefeld 2017, ISBN 978-3-8376-3126-5 ( transcript-verlag.de - Open Access at the publisher).

literature

  • Ellen Balka: Obituary: Susan Leigh Star (1954-2010) . In: Social Studies of Science . tape 40 , no. 4 , 2010, p. 647-651 , JSTOR : 25746354 (obituary).
  • Susan Leigh Star Special Issue. In: Mind, Culture, and Activity, 22, 2015, No. 2. 2015, accessed on September 20, 2018 (English).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g Susan Leigh Star et al .: Border objects and media research . Ed .: Sebastian Gießmann, Nadine Taha. 1st edition. Transcript, Bielefeld 2017, ISBN 978-3-8376-3126-5 , "Study the unstudied" - On the media science topicality of Susan Leigh Stars' thinking.
  2. ^ Susan Leigh Star: Regions of the mind. Brain research and the quest for scientific certainty . Stanford University Press, Stanford, Calif. 1989, ISBN 0-8047-1673-0 .
  3. ^ University of Pittsburgh University Marketing Communications Web Team: University Times »Obituary: Susan“ Leigh ”Star. Accessed February 28, 2018 .
  4. ↑ Ellen Balka: Obituary: Susan Leigh Star (1954-2010) . In: Social Studies of Science . tape 40 , no. 4 , 2010, p. 647-651 , JSTOR : 25746354 .
  5. ↑ a b Jörg Strübing: Key Works of Science et Technology Studies . Ed .: Diana Lengersdorf, Matthias Wieser. Springer VS, Wiesbaden 2014, ISBN 978-3-531-19454-7 , Geoffrey C. Bowker and Susan Leigh Star: Pragmatistic research on information infrastructures and their policies.
  6. ↑ Susan Leigh Star: Living grounded theory: Cognitive and emotional forms of pragmatism . In: Antony Bryant, Kathy Charmaz (Eds.): The SAGE handbook of grounded theory . SAGE, Los Angeles 2007, ISBN 978-1-84920-478-1 , pp. 75-94 .
  7. ^ A b Susan Leigh Star, James R. Griesemer: Institutional Ecology, 'Translations' and Boundary Objects: Amateurs and Professionals in Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, 1907-39 . tape 19 , no. 3 , August 1, 1989, pp. 387-420 .
  8. ^ Susan Leigh Star, Karen Ruhleder: Steps towards an ecology of infrastructure: complex problems in design and access for large-scale collaborative systems . ACM, 1994, ISBN 0-89791-689-1 , pp. 253-264 , doi : 10.1145 / 192844.193021 .
  9. ^ Susan Leigh Star, Geoffrey C. Bowker: Sorting things out: classification and its consequences . MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. 1999, ISBN 978-0-262-52295-3 .
  10. ^ Susan Leigh Star, Anselm Strauss: Layers of Silence, Arenas of Voice: The Ecology of Visible and Invisible Work . In: Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW) . tape 8 , no. 1-2 , March 1, 1999, ISSN  0925-9724 , p. 9-30 , doi : 10.1023 / a: 1008651105359 .
  11. ↑ Star, Susan Leigh: Sex differences and the dichotomization of the brain: Methods, limits and problems in research on consciousness . Gordian Press, New York 1979.
personal data
SURNAME Star, Susan Leigh
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American sociologist
DATE OF BIRTH 3rd July 1954
DATE OF DEATH March 24, 2010