SOCI 347 - Asian Sociotechnical Imaginaries

Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)

(Same as ASIA 347 and STS 347) Technological development is not “simply a matter of advances in science and technology, but a product of complex entanglements among knowledge, technical capability, politics, and culture” (Jasanoff 2005, 290). Thinking of science and technology in Asia in particular brings to mind images of unparalleled development, the futuristic, the optimistic, the dystopian, and disaster simultaneously.

This seminar examines key topics at the intersection of science, society, and the state in contemporary Asia. We will analyze questions like how are cutting edge technologies employed in governance in different Asian states? How has science been used to craft imaginaries of the self and the nation in Asia? Are the dynamics of technological development in Asia unique, and how do they shape Asian nation’s position on the global stage? By delving in-depth into different international cases from across the Asian continent, we examine how science and technology shape—and are shaped by—structures of inequality, social identities, states’ governance strategies, and society’s counter-movements against the state. Weekly topics include, but are not limited to, pandemic management and public health, genetic nationalism, biopolitics, coercive environmentalism, contending with nuclear disaster, models of technological innovation, surveillance capitalism, scientism in policy making, internet politics, and human-robot co-existence. National contexts include China, Japan, Korea, Russia, Ukraine, Singapore, India, and Indonesia. Abigail Coplin.

One 3-hour period.

Course Format: CLS