Biology 385/English 380 - History of the Scientific Research Article - Spring 2024

This semester, you and a partner will become class specialists in one of the following social forces. While interconnected and sometimes overlapping, these are useful categories for thinking systematically about the forces that have encouraged stability and change in the history of the scientific research article. During each of our units, you and your partner will research the role of your chosen force on the SRA during that time period.

Below, we have identified seven forces we find important to the history of the SRA and given you some leads for how to define the category. These are not exhaustive and should be considered starting points. Please think critically and creatively about your force and feel free to talk through your thinking with us at any point in your process.

Producing Knowledge - Scientific Technologies

1. Technologies that help us see/perceive more

2. Technologies that help us analyze more/differently

3. Digitization and datafication

4. Nature of evidence

5. Specialization of science

6. Replication crisis (registered reports, video methods articles)

7. Information explosion (need for literature reviews, meta-analyses)

Communicating Knowledge - Communication Technologies and Media

1. Technologies of production

2. Printing press

3. Copper plates, cameras, and other technologies of visual representation 

4. Internet

5. Media - Book, journal, PDF, video, etc.

6. Distribution technologies like databases, social media

7. Publishing experiments

8. Access by researchers, students, journalists, the public

9. Storage capacity, archives, physical and digital storage

10. New media affordances for communication - multimodality

11. Publishing industry/economy

Working Collectively - Scientific Communities

1. Peer readers/audiences, within and across specialties (inter and intraspecialistic)

2. Collaboration

3. Peer evaluation

4. Education of the next generation (the “pipeline”; pedagogical needs)

5. Professional inclusion (gender, race, language, geographic location, etc.)

6. Professional associations

7. Influential individuals (editors, scientists)

8. Social status and capital

Communicating with the Public - Audiences, Partners, Critics

1. Scientific literacy

2. Public understanding of science vs engagement

3. Science communication

4. Crisis of expertise

5. Scientific controversies (evolution, etc.)

6. Science journalism

7. Citizen science

Judging Science - Ethics and Values

1. Access

2. DEI + Belonging

3. Linguistic justice

4. Ethical research (animals, humans, etc.)

5. Ethical communication (fabrication, plagiarism)

6. See Ch. 3 in Penrose & Katz (on reserve)

Sponsoring Science - Economic and Material Conditions

1. Economic and materials dimensions of doing science

2. Faculty/scientific positions  (universities, industry, etc.)

3. Grant-giving organizations

4. Patrons and wealthy individuals (gentlemen of science)

5. Achieving high impact to sustain science

6. High costs of doing and publishing science

7. Access to objects of inquiry (e.g., Darwin’s voyage on the HMS Beagle)

8. Ability to hire people (e.g., lab assistants, etc.)

9. Access to education and employment (assistantships, fellowships, postdocs)

Shaping Science - Sociocultural and Political Influences 

1. Types of governments - monarchy, democracy, etc. 

2. National ambitions (military)

3. Political parties and movements

4. Worldviews, ideologies, culture

5. Social structures and hierarchies

6. Religion

7. Sexism, racism, etc.

8. Cultural relationships with and narratives about nature

9. Science in literature, film, popular culture