Yesterday we sent off two FISP applications. The first asked for money to develop a prototype of a map called From Kumeyaay Nation to Biotech Beach: a radical cartography of UCSD and its environs, pitching it as ‘a tool for diversity training on this campus.’ The proposed post-docs, James Deavenport and Ulices Pina, are both finishing up PhDs in Latin American history. Ulices, who recently won an award from the Mexican government for his work, has family ties south of the border and a deep knowledge of the historical terrain. James is a radical cartographer working on mapping the archaeology of the indigenous Amazon. They just happened to be the graders for my history of bioethics class this quarter, which is serendipitous given that James has already made a digital map of historical changes to Kumeyaay land!
The other FISP application is a proposal to conduct some fieldwork in the nascent field of philosophy of science-in-practice. This one was entirely dreamed up by Ben Sheredos, currently a post-doc in biology, having done a joint PhD here in philosophy and cognitive science. As you can see from this summary, Ben is quite the interdisciplinarian. He assures me that he regrets not joining Science Studies for his PhD, and he does seem to be making up for lost time this quarter by taking Bob’s Introduction to Science Studies, as well as agreeing to give a joint presentation at the colloquium in a few weeks…
Exciting! If there is a chance for undergrads to hear about or contribute to the radical mapping project, let me know. I’m teaching my undergrad junior seminar “The Social Life of Innovation” in the spring. You can see the syllabus here: http://thiscourse.com/ucsd/comm190/fa15/
but we read around innovation from perspectives of gender, racialization, underdevelopment, economization, etc. If they can help with mapping local innovation and its others, it would fit well with what we learn!
What a fabulous syllabus! If there was a way to have your students do a project on local innovation — who it includes and who it might exclude — that would fit right in. It would be wonderful to chew over some possibilities….
That is exactly the kind of project I’m always trying to get them to do. Last year, I had them put together zines about innovation at the margins. I thought about having them do local observation, interviews, and write ups the first time I taught the class but wasn’t sure it was worth taking community time without a bigger outcome to contribute to. The larger project you’re working on here would be a helpful anchoring context though so they could have a stronger sense of what they are aiming for.
Let’s hope the grant comes through!
Thanks so much, Lily. There seem to be a lot of people here who could contribute to this. Fingers crossed…