PROFESSOR GREG DOWNEY
Uncovering Information Labor

LIS 810

Spring 2007
4246 H.C. White
2:30pm-5:00pm Tue

The theme of “information labor” unites several areas of research within science and technology studies: the study of information / communication technologies in social context, the investigation of the artifacts and infrastructures of scientific and technical work practices, and the global transformation of the spatio-temporal conditions for knowledge production, organization, distribution, and consumption.

By focusing on the ways that human labor is “hidden” behind (or embodied within) technological appliances, networks, and interfaces, this seminar will confont the question of human agency and human value in producing and reproducing technological infrastructures of all sorts — the built environment of physical and virtual space where more and more social processes, involving more and more social actors, are (at least in part) taking place every day.

These questions are of interest not only to the field of STS, but to other disciplines such as library and information studies, mass communication research, and geography.

Speakers

Current list of guest speakers (alphabetical order):

Geoffrey C. Bowker
Center for Science, Technology, and Society
Santa Clara University

"My main current research interests are in the field of classification and standardization: in particular asking how these play into the development of scientific cyberinfrastructure. My recent Memory Practices in the Sciences looks at information infrstructures and storytelling in a science over the past two hundred years. It looks at geology in the 1830s, cybernetics in the 1950s and environmental sciences today - weaving together their information infrastructure and the stories that they tell about their objects. My next book after that - How to Read Databases - is coming slowly along."

• • •

James W. Cortada
Independent Scholar

"James W. Cortada has held a variety of sales, consulting, management, and executive positions at IBM over the past 27 years. He is the author of over two dozen books and over a 100 articles on the management and history of information technology, and is a leading authority on the contemporary role of information in American society. He has a BA, MA, and Ph.D. in modern history and lives in Madison, Wisconsin. He can be reached at jwcorta@us.ibm.com."

• • •

Nathan Ensmenger
History & Sociology of Science
University of Pennsylvania

"Nathan Ensmenger teaches courses in the history of technology in the History and Sociology of Science department. He also teaches courses on engineering ethics and professionalism in the School of Engineering and Applied Science.  His current research interests are aimed at reintegrating the history of the "information revolution'' -- very broadly defined to encompass a wide range of 19th and 20th century scientific, technological and social developments -- into mainstream American social and cultural history. His courses include The Information Age, Computers, Ethics and Society, CyberCulture, and Technology and Society."

• • •

Josh Greenberg
Center for History and New Media
George Mason University

"Josh Greenberg is an Assistant Research Professor and Associate Director of the Exploring and Collecting History Online project at George Mason University's Center for History and New Media. He received his bachelor's degree in the History of Science, Medicine and Technology from Johns Hopkins University, and his PhD from Cornell University's Department of Science & Technology Studies, where his dissertation focused on the history of VCRs and video stores between 1975 and 1990."

• • •

Jennifer Light
School of Communication
Northwestern University

"Jennifer S. Light is an associate professor at Northwestern University, in the School of Communication and the Departments of History and Sociology, and Faculty Associate at the Institute for Policy Research. She received an AB in History and Literature (1993) and PhD in History of Science (1999) from Harvard University, and also holds an MPhil in History and Philosophy of Science from Cambridge University (1994), where she was the Lionel de Jersey Harvard Scholar. Light has taught courses on the history and sociology of technology at Northwestern, Harvard, and the University of Edinburgh, and held the Derek Brewer Visiting Fellowship at Cambridge University. She has also consulted for the RAND Corporation's National Defense Research Institute."

• • •

Vincent Mosco -
Queen's University (Canada)

"Vincent Mosco is the Canada Research Chair in Communication and Society at Queen's University. Professor Mosco graduated from Georgetown University (Summa Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa) in 1970 and received his Ph.D. in Sociology from Harvard University in 1975. Professor Mosco is the author of numerous books, articles and policy reports on the media, telecommunications, computers and information technology. His most recent book, The Digital Sublime: Myth, Power, and Cyberspace (MIT Press, 2004), won the 2005 Olson Award for outstanding book in the field of rhetoric and cultural studies. He is also the author of Continental Order? Integrating North America for Cybercapitalism (edited with Dan Schiller and published by Rowman and Littlefield, 2001) and The Political Economy of Communication: Rethinking and Renewal (Sage, 1996)which has been translated into Chinese (two editions- Beijing and Taiwan), Spanish, and Korean. In 2004 Professor Mosco received the Dallas W. Smythe Award for outstanding achievement in communication research."

• • •

Gina Neff
Universityof Washington

"Gina Neff, Assistant Professor, studies the relationship between society and communication technologies, as well as between culture and communication. Her research focuses on 1) how work, communication technologies, and organizational structures relate to one another and 2) the commercial production of mediated culture in communication industries. Her current research projects include a book manuscript entitled Venture Labor on work and discourses of risk in high-tech firms, a project on internships and the entry-level labor market in communication industries, and on-going documentation of organizational challenges that high-tech and innovative industries face. She holds both a Ph.D. in sociology and a B.A. in economics and Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures from Columbia University."

• • •

Amy Slaton
Department of History & Politics
Drexel University

Amy Slaton received her PhD in the History and Sociology of Science from the University of Pennsylvania. She is an associate professor at Drexel University and director of Drexel's Master's Program in Science, Technology and Society. Her previous work includes a book on labor and design changes brought to the construction industry by the introduction of science-based materials testing after 1900 (/Reinforced Concrete and the Modernization of American Building, 1900-1930 /[Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 2001]). That study focused on the embodiment of skill and workplace authority via routine engineering practices, particularly through the creation of standards and instruments. She is currently completing a history of race in American engineering education since 1950 (forthcoming, Harvard University Press). Departing from policy and pedagogical studies on the topic, which focus solely on the achievement of greater access to engineering for under-represented minorities, this book locates the racial ideologies which inhere in technical epistemologies and practices.

Assignments

Attendance and participation: 20%

Some absences are inevitable, but please make sure that when you come to class, you come to participate rather than simply to listen.  If you can, inform the instructor in advance when you need to miss a class.

Each student will be responsible for leading one of our discussions during the course of the semester. 

Regular discussion presentations involve writing up a list of several possible discussion topics or questions, with about a paragraph of elaboration on each, to be posted on the main class weblog at least 48 hours before class. (You can divide up this work and take these discussion topics directly from your individual reader-response journals.)  All other students not presenting may then post reactions as "comments" on the class weblog.  Your group will be expected to lead the first 45 minutes or so of discussion for that week, so divide up the time and topics accordingly.

You will also need to subscribe to our course weblog in order to view important announcements and postings from the professor and your fellow students.  This weblog is hosted on the free public Blogger service. You will receive an email inviting you to join the weblog, and in the process of signing up you will be able to create your own personal weblog which you will use as a reader-response journal (see below).

Finally, you should also subscribe to the free Bloglines service (separate from Blogger) in order to monitor changes in the course weblog.  Bloglines allows you to display "headlines" or "RSS feeds" from many different weblogs at once, and quickly shows which blogs have new postings.  Becoming familiar with using online "social networking" technologies like Blogger and Bloglines is an important goal of this class.

On days with guest speakers, students will participate in class discussion from 2:30-3:30, and then attend the speaker's presentation from 4:00-5:00.  When possible, students will be offered the chance to have lunch and/or dinner with guest speakers (lunch paid for by the professor).

Critical response journal: 20%

Each student must create an online journal for recording week-by-week reactions to the readings.  Entries do not have to be long; a paragraph or two will suffice. You should simply come up with one specific reaction to something said in each reading — a claim, a question, a point of evidence — suitable for further discussion in class. 

Your reading journal will be the personal weblog that you create using the Blogger service.  You should use the Blogger settings to create an RSS "Atom" feed for your reading journal, so that the other students in your group can "subscribe" to your online journal using the separate Bloglines service.  You should also subscribe to their journals through Bloglines as well. 

As your Blogger reader-response journals will be searchable over the Internet, please use professional judgement in the way you speak about others and yourself. 

Analytical book review: 20%

Each student must choose and read one outside book (monograph or edited volume) dealing in some way with information technology and society.  The student will prepare an analytical review of this book, of no more than 10 pages in length, relating it to the themes and readings of the class.  Book reviews will be due near the end of the semester, and each student will present a summary of their book in class.

Interview with a guest speaker: 20%

Each student will be assigned to interview one of our guest speakers for 15-20 minutes.  These interviews will be recorded and podcasted out to the wider university community.  Students need to familiarize themselves with the background and writings of the person they are going to interview, and come up with a short list of interesting questions to ask about the person's research topic, findings, methods, or theories.  (Imagine a short NPR interview that would be of use to other graduate students curious about the person's work.)

Final written project : 20%

Each student must design and complete a final written project of no more than 20 pages in length.  This may be a policy analysis and recommendation, a secondary literature review essay, a theoretical/philosophical essay, or a traditional primary-source research paper.  The goal is for each student to produce written work of relevance to that student's educational and career goals.

Grade distribution

These percent values are a general guide to my grading:

A    90 - 100
AB  85 - 89
B    75 - 84
BC  70 - 74
C    60 - 69

Texts to purchase

Thomas J. Misa, Philip Brey, and Andrew Feenberg, eds, Modernity and technology (2004).  "If asked, most people would agree that there are deep connections between technology and the modern world, and even that technology is the truly distinctive feature of modernity. Until recently, however, there has been surprisingly little overlap between technology studies and modernity theory. The goal of this ambitious book is to lay the foundations for a new interdisciplinary field by closely examining the co-construction of technology and modernity." — from the publisher

Aad Blok and Greg Downey, eds., Uncovering Labour in Information Revolutions, 1750-2000 [International Review of Social History supplement 11] (Cambridge University Press, 2004). "Most discussions of the present-day Information Revolution are focused on the technological developments in the realm of information and communication, and tend to overlook both the human labour involved in the development, maintenance and daily use of these information and communication technologies (ICTs), and the consequences of the implementation of these ICTs for the position and divisions of labour.  This volume aims to redress this imbalance by exploring the role, position and divisions of information and communication labour in the broadest sense through periods of revolutionary technological change. With contributions on a variety of geographies in this latest as well as in earlier information ages, this collection offers a comparative insight into the continuities and discontinuities in information revolutions."

Felix Stalder, Manuel Castells: The theory of the network society (2006).  "Manuel Castells's highly acclaimed trilogy The Information Age represents the most comprehensive attempt to develop a coherent theory of the present day. From his seminal work on urban change and social movements to his more recent work on the transformations stemming from the deployment of new information and communication technologies in a globalized world, Castells has been at the forefront of contemporary debates for over three decades. At the heart of his theory lies the claim that we are witnessing a shift from vertically integrated hierarchies to flexible networks which structure dominant social processes, as well as the main challenges launched against them. His scope, rigor, and style have earned him favorable comparison with Marx and Weber.This book provides the first complete study of Castells's theory of the network society. It is a critical examination of his account of "informational capitalism," of global social movements as the source of new values, and of networked governance. Felix Stalder also provides an original and in-depth account of the theory of the "space of flows" and of Castells's particular notion of the network.The book serves as both an excellent introduction to Castells's wide-ranging theories and an innovative critique which contributes to ongoing debates in the field." — from the publisher

Alfred D. Chandler and James W. Cortada, eds., A Nation Transformed by Information: How Information Has Shaped the United States from Colonial Times to the Present (2003). "Does the Information Age predate computers? Does it, in fact, predate the Industrial Age? Though this thesis isn't explicitly examined in A Nation Transformed by Information: How Information Has Shaped the United States from Colonial Times to the Present, the reader can't help but think about it throughout. Editors Alfred D. Chandler Jr. and James W. Cortada assembled a healthy mix of historians and management consultants to write the history of information services in America, and the very mild pro-business bias is more than balanced by the deeper insight into the companies and corporations that did much to spur technological change." — from the publisher

Jennifer S. Light, From Warfare to Welfare: Defense Intellectuals and Urban Problems in Cold War America (2003). "Jennifer S. Light argues that the technologies and values of the cold war fundamentally shaped the history of postwar urban America. From Warfare to Welfare examines how American intellectuals, city leaders, and the federal government chose to attack problems in the nation's cities by borrowing techniques and technologies first designed for military engagement with foreign enemies. Facing threats like urban chaos, blight, and unrest, urban problem solvers adapted the expertise of defense professionals. Light traces the transfer of innovations from military to city planning and management. She thereby reveals how a continuing source of inspiration for American city administrators lay in the nation's preparations for war." — from the publisher

Vincent Mosco, The Digital Sublime: Myth, Power, and Cyberspace (2005). "Myths are not just falsehoods that can be disproved, Mosco points out, but stories that lift us out of the banality of everyday life into the possibility of the sublime. He argues that if we take what we know about cyberspace and situate it within what we know about culture -- specifically the central post-Cold War myths of the end of history, geography, and politics -- we will add to our knowledge about the digital world; we need to see it "with both eyes" -- that is, to understand it both culturally and materially. After examining the myths of cyberspace and going back in history to look at the similar mythic pronouncements prompted by past technological advances -- the telephone, the radio, and television, among others -- Mosco takes us to Ground Zero. In the final chapter he considers the twin towers of the World Trade Center -- our icons of communication, information, and trade -- and their part in the politics, economics, and myths of cyberspace." — from the publisher

Geoffrey C. Bowker and Susan Leigh Star, Sorting Things Out: Classification and Its Consequences (2000).  "Is this book sociology, anthropology, or taxonomy? Sorting Things Out, by communications theorists Geoffrey C. Bowker and Susan Leigh Star, covers a lot of conceptual ground in its effort to sort out exactly how and why we classify and categorize the things and concepts we encounter day to day. But the analysis doesn't stop there; the authors go on to explore what happens to our thinking as a result of our classifications. With great insight and precise academic language, they pick apart our information systems and language structures that lie deeper than the everyday categories we use. The authors focus first on the International Classification of Diseases (ICD), a widely used scheme used by health professionals worldwide, but also look at other health information systems, racial classifications used by South Africa during apartheid, and more." — from the publisher

Special needs

McBurney Center

Persons with disabilities are to be fully included in this course. Please let me know if you need any special accommodations to enable you to fully participate. I will try to maintain confidentiality of the information you share with me. To request academic accomodations, please register with the McBurney Disability Resource Center.

Academic honesty

Misconduct Guide

Academic honesty requires that the course work (drafts, reports, examinations, papers) a student presents to an instructor honestly and accurately indicates the student's own academic efforts. If you are unsure about what qualifies as academic dishonesty, please consult the Academic Misconduct Guide for Students.  It goes without saying that copying or paraphrasing material from web pages without proper quotation and citation is plagiarism and will be taken very seriously, quitely likely resulting in a failing grade for the course.

The UW-Madison is committed to creating a dynamic, diverse and welcoming learning environment for all students and has a non-discrimination policy that reflects this philosophy. Disrespectful behaviors or comments addressed towards any group or individual, regardless of race/ethnicity, sexuality, gender, religion, ability, or any other difference is deemed unacceptable in this class, and will be addressed publicly by the professor.

Have a great summer Grades are posted and summer has begun, but I wanted to quickly thank you all for a great semester. If any of you will be around this summer, keep an eye out for our informal SLIS Summer Reading Group, where we'll be working through three books over the next three months. Cheers, GREG

About the instructor

Greg Downey <gdowney @ wisc.edu> is an associate professor with a 50 percent appointment in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication and a 50 percent appointment in the School of Library and Information Studies.  His teaching and research both center on the history and geography of information and communication technology and labor.

Downey joined the UW faculty in 2001. Downey holds a B.S. and M.S. in computer science from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, an M.A. In liberal studies from Northwestern University, and a joint Ph.D. in history of technology and human geography from the Johns Hopkins University. Before coming to Madison, Downey spent a year as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Geography at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities.

His industry experience as a computer analyst includes three years at the Leo Burnett advertising agency in Chicago, and three years at Roger Schank’s Institute for Learning Sciences at Northwestern University. He has held short-term volunteer positions with both the Center for Neighborhood Technology in Chicago and the Community Information Exchange in Washington D.C.

Downey’s dissertation research followed the story of a particular category of information workers, telegraph messenger boys, through a century of changes in the U.S. telegraph network from 1850 to 1950. His book based on this research, Telegraph Messenger Boys: Labor, Technology, and Geography, 1850-1950, was published by Routledge in 2002.

He is currently working on a study of the discourse of  the "digital divide" in the US between 1984-2004, and a history and geography of audio/visual text captioning labor and technology worldwide over the 20th century.

Optional readings

• [anonymous] "This job isn't nearly as exciting as the DeVry Institute lead me to believe," The Onion (13 August 2003) (2 pages). PDF
• Daniel Bell, The Coming of Post-Industrial Society (originally published 1973; 1999 edition).
• Erik Brynjolfsson and Lorin M. Hitt, "Beyond the productivity paradox," Communications of the ACM 41:8 (Aug 1998) (7 pages). PDF
• Manuel Castells, The network society, 2nd ed. (2000).
• Manuel Castells, ed., The Network Society: A Cross-Cultural Perspective (2005)
• Jonathon N. Cummings and Robert Kraut, "Domesticating computers and the Internet," Information Society 18 (2002) (12 pages). PDF
• P.W. Daniels, "Reflections on the 'old' economy, 'new' economy, and services," Growth and Change 35:2 (2004) (24 pages). PDF
• Greg Downey, "Virtual Webs, Physical Technologies, Hidden Workers: The Spaces of Labor in Information Internetworks" Technology and Culture 42:2 (2001), 209-235 (25 pages). PDF 212K
• Nathan Ensmenger, “Power to the people: toward a social history of computing,” IEEE Annals
  of the History of Computing 26:1(2004), pp. 95-96.
• Nathan Ensmenger, "Letting the ‘Computer Boys’ Take Over: Technology and the Politics of Organizational Transformation,” International Review of Social History 48:11 (2003), pp. 152-180.
• Nathan Ensmenger, “The ’Question of Professionalism’ in the Computing Fields,” IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 4(2001), pp. 56-73.
• Nathan Ensmenger and William Aspray, “Software as Labor Process,” in Mapping the History of Computing: Software Issues, U. Hashagen, R. Keil-Slawik, A. Norberg, eds. (New York: Springer-Verlag, 2002).
• Liza Featherstone, "Will Labor Take the Wal-Mart Challenge?" Nation (June 28, 2004) (5 pages). PDF
• Jamie Gough, “Work, class and social life,” in Rachel Pain, ed., Introducing social geographies (2001), 13-43.
• Josh Greenberg, "Between Expert and Lay," IEEE Annals of the History of Computing 27.2 (April 2005).
• Will Hutton, "The American prosperity myth," Nation (01 September 2003) (6 pages). PDF
• Nina Lerman, Arwen P. Mohun, and Ruth Oldenziel, "The shoulders we stand on and the view from here: Historiography and directions for future research," Technology and Culture 38:1 [special issue on gender and technology] (1997).
• Jennifer S. Light, “When computers were women,” Technology and Culture 40:3 (July 1999), 455-483 (30 pages). PDF
• Robert Lucore, "Challenges and opportunities: Unions confront the new information technologies," Journal of Labor Research 23:2 (Spring 2002) (15 pages). PDF
• Jane Margolis, Allan Fisher and Faye Miller, "The anatomy of interest: Women in undergraduate computer science," Women's Studies Quarterly (Spring/Summer 2000) (35 pages). PDF
• Pew Internet Life Report, "Wired workers: Who they are, what they’re doing online" [press release] (September 3, 2000) (2 pages). PDF
• Mark Poster, “Workers as cyborgs: Labor and networked computers,” Journal of Labor Research 23:3 (2002) (16 pages). PDF
• Monica Prasad, "International capital on 'Silicon Plateau': Work and control in India's computer industry," Social Forces (Dec 1998) (24 pages). PDF
• Jo Twist, "Robots get bookish in libraries," BBC News (21 July 2004) (2 pages). PDF

Optional films

Crossing the divide: Creating a high-tech work force. (2000). 57 min.  "All over America, schools are scrambling for computers and Internet access. But have the huge expenditures really produced a tangible return on investment? In this program, teachers, administrators, and other education professionals share their experiences and opinions regarding the potential and the pitfalls of education technology. They address the proper use of computers, the integration of the Internet into lessons, and the urgent need for teacher training, long-term planning, and ongoing infrastructure funding. They also question the deeper cost of school budgets skewed toward technology at the expense of the arts and humanities." — PBS