NSF-ESRC Workshop Background

NSF/ESRC Sponsored Special Activity:

Agenda-setting Workshop to explore Anthropological Applications and Development of e-Science/CyberInfrastructure

Michael Fischer (Kent), H. Russell Bernard (lorida), David Zeitlyn (Kent)

• Organisation and Format
• Objectives
• Themes and Topics

General Background

New generations of social scientists face a different range of possibilities and prospects in their research than most researchers currently in post. Developments stemming from shared ES/CI will be a major source for these differences regardless of how anthropology develops. However, anthropology-specific ES/CI has the potential to greatly impact our practice, advancing the scale of activities rendered feasible, significant changes in the kinds of research carried out and, perhaps most importantly, the kinds of subjects deemed researchable. The opportunities for studying these issues will be driven both by changes in societies and advances in our methods - increased capacity to do some of the same things either better or on a larger scale, and to carry out hitherto unimaginable activities relating to data collection, analysis and dissemination. Many of the new capabilities will enable anthropologists to operationalise well developed conceptual and terminological models, while others will enable new theoretical vocabularies and concepts to develop.

A number of questions emerge. How will we deal with new kinds of relationships? What do we do with the vast amounts of data that become available from technologically enhanced observation and participation? What new methods can emerge? How will formidable ethical issues be addressed? How do we study social and cultural phenomena that only exist for a few years, months or even weeks? How do we adapt to depending on 'smart' technological assistants in our research? How will we be able to disseminate our results, not just in static form but in formats that directly interact with potential users?

A safe mechanism for predicting the short term future (3-7 years) of the ES/CI in anthropological research is simply to look at what a minority of computer and network savvy individuals are able to do now. James Dow in 1992 accurately predicted much of the development of computing in mainstream anthropology over the following decade simply by looking at what the minority were doing at the time.