Dissertation Research: Ghost in the Machine: Phantom - Prosthetic Relations

对技术进步与疾病的性质和分类之间的关系感兴趣，这项科学和技术研究论文研究改进补助金将研究假肢科学的创新和被称为幻肢综合征（PLS）的医学现象。 从广义上讲，这项工作将构成对肢解现代化的社会文化和历史分析，对用于替换因截肢而失去的身体部分的技术的扩展和复杂化以及PLS在分类、因果假设和治疗方案方面的修改感兴趣。 这个定性项目将采用一些研究方法，包括半结构化，开放式访谈;历史和档案数据的分析;从1930年至今发表的关于幻肢的医学文献的内容分析;在线资源和文件的审查;和主流和替代媒体的审查。 NSF的资金将支持与主要研究人员的访谈，这些研究人员致力于PL的各个方面，包括理论化，特征化，患病率，疼痛和治疗方面，将亲自进行。将努力在每个研究中心访问实验室空间，观察工作并采访其他相关人员。 该项目的智力价值包括对肢解的社会文化分析。 肢解是临床文献中广泛讨论的一个问题，在残疾文献中有牵连，并在最近一波对经验或生活账户感兴趣的体现理论中提到。 值得注意的是，缺乏一个理论上知情的社会文化检查的交叉肢解和身体的技术。此外，这项工作有助于医学社会学的子学科。 医学社会学认真对待科学，技术和医学在当代认识论和本体论问题的生产中的作用。理论化和调查健康，康复，健康，疾病和死亡的文化，话语，制度和/或关系方面的项目被认为是该领域的核心贡献。拟议的工作整合了知识，技能和技术相关的部分损失，部分更换，和生活垃圾的检查。 更广泛地说，近年来，社会科学家已经开始从身体和身体两方面建立理论。 本项目试图将这些问题与科学技术研究直接联系起来。 因此，这项工作将有助于：1）身体作为研究对象和场所的分析输入; 2）身体技术与社会身体和个体身体（在这种情况下截肢者）的理论并列。 此外，这个项目是敏感的认识论，本体论，伦理/道德和政治关切有关生物技术的连接，并直接与多方面的技术恐惧症/亲鸿沟。实际上，关于肢解，幻肢综合征和假肢科学的知识的综合和分析：1）将为这一领域的未来研究提供信息; 2）可能是截肢者和其他人的宝贵资源。

Interested in the relationship between technological advance and the nature and classification of disease, this Science and Technology Studies Dissertation Research Improvement Grant will examine innovations in prosthetic science and the medical phenomenon known as phantom limb syndrome (PLS). Broadly, this work will constitute a socio-cultural and historical analysis of the modernization of dismemberment, interested in the expansion and sophistication of technologies used to replace parts of the body lost to amputation, and the modification of PLS in terms of classification, causal assumptions and treatment options. This qualitative project will employ a number of research methods including semi-structured, open-ended interviews; analysis of historical and archival data; content analysis of medical literature published on phantom limb from 1930 to the present; review of online resources and documents; and review of mainstream and alternative media. NSF funds will support interviews with key researchers working on aspects of PL including aspects of theorizing, characterizing, prevalence, pain, and treatment, will be conducted in person. Efforts will be made at each site to visit lab space, observe work and interview other relevant persons. The intellectual merit of this project includes a socio-cultural analysis of dismemberment. Dismemberment is an issue extensively discussed in the clinical literature, implicated in the disability literature, and alluded to within the recent wave of theories of embodiment interested in experiential or lived accounts. Notably absent is a theoretically informed socio-cultural examination of the intersection of dismemberment and technologies of the body. Further, this work contributes to the sub-discipline of medical sociology. Medical sociology takes seriously the role of sciences, technologies and medicines in the production of contemporary epistemological and ontological concerns. Projects that theorize and investigate the cultural, discursive, institutional and/or relational aspects of health, healing, wellness, illness and death, are considered core contributions to the field. The proposed work integrates an examination of the knowledges, techniques, and technologies relevant to part-loss, part-replacement, and lived partiality. More broadly, in recent years, social scientists have begun to theorize both about and from the body. This project attempts to connect these concerns directly with the study of science and technology. Thus, this work will contribute to: 1) the analytic import of the body as an object and site of inquiry; and 2) the theoretical juxtaposition of technologies of the body with both the social body and individual bodies (in this case-amputees). In addition, this project is sensitive to epistemological, ontological, ethical/moral and political concerns regarding bio-technological joinings and engages directly with the multifaceted techno phobic/philic divide. Practically, the synthesis and analysis of knowledge concerning dismemberment, phantom limb syndrome and prosthetic science: 1) will function to inform future research in this area; and 2) may be valuable as a resource to amputees and others.