I just finished what may be my favorite book of the year: The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz. I’ll try not to spoil too much in the review because I really think you should go read it or listen to it. The book follows protagonists living in a mini-utopia – a group charged with protecting the […]
In their seminal book on classifications and infrastructures, Sorting things out: Classification and its consequences, Geoffrey Bowker and Susan Leigh Star conclude: We have argued in this book that it is politically and ethically crucial to recognize the vital role of infrastructure in the “built moral environment.” Seemingly purely technical issues like how to name […]
In Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer tells a number of stories that challenge the ways Western science constructs knowledge, and therefore understands nature. In one example, she discusses the ways trees help and communicate with each other through symbiotic mycelia. Because experts study individual trees, or via Darwinism, competition for survival/reproduction, it was impossible for […]
Data systems in non-profits are nearly always built to track, manage, and analyze individual clients/service users. In fact, this is a base assumption of such systems, and the vast majority of the literature on the topic supports this assumption. The problem with tracking service users.. well, there’s a lot. Here’s a few: We need not […]
Of the 5 prompts for Conceptualizing better data work in non-profits, Participatory (Action) Research, Evaluation, and Design is the approach I’ve already advocated for the most. In my most recent paper, we suggested that an opportunity for approaching data work in non-profits involves trying to “Build ways for youths and frontline staff to help create […]
This posts belongs to a series, Conceptualizing better data work in non-profits: First steps toward practice, in which I’m developing 5 prompts for orienting non-profit discussions about data work that can be organized toward justice. Each prompt is meant to provoke and ground ideas for organizational change that would include transformations in data work. The […]
This is the second in a blog post series, the introduction to which is: Conceptualizing better data work in non-profits: First steps toward practice. Reggio Emilia is an approach to democratic education that originated in preschools in Italy and is now used around the world in schools across age ranges. It’s worthy of some closer […]
In the last couple years, I’ve published 3 articles regarding the use of data in non-profit organizations. As I see it now, I’ve accomplished 2 out of 3 goals I had when I started this work many years ago as a dissertation project. Each of these stages has been a serious challenge for me. The […]
It came to my attention recently that I’ve not seen (or don’t remember) a place where the politics embedded in popular education pedagogies are made explicit. Even finding the right language for this has been challenging, and I’ve searched under a number of terms. At best, this is described as the “values” of popular education, […]
Apparently Luddism is making a comeback. Ted Chiang just wrote about it in The New Yorker (Will A.I. Become the New McKinsey), Angela Watercutter on the writer’s guild strike at Wired, and Cory Doctorow on sci-fi as a Luddite literature (and back in February). Of course, it’s been here and there discussed for years (What […]