The Tropical Forest as a Boundary Object: An Ethnography of Multiple Collectives and Social Worlds

这项博士后奖学金由科学与社会计划和生物学理事会资助，支持在圣克拉拉大学杰弗里·鲍克和苏珊·利·斯塔尔指导下的埃本·柯克西的高级培训，以及巴拿马史密森尼热带研究所的人种学研究。在五个特定的科学研究文献中接受高级指导培训：交互、社会世界、仪器、生物多样性和基础设施。培训地点位于加州北部，可以接触到更广泛的科学研究网络，通过在该地区的多个校区跟随一系列演讲者，使联合项目负责人能够跟上前沿学术的步伐。在史密森尼热带研究所（STRI），一系列科学仪器和日常技术被汇集在一起，研究与人类有关的植物、动物和微生物。人种学涉及对STRI共存的多个科学项目的研究。这个地方的民族志——巴拿马中部的热带雨林——探索了科学家、副分类学家、生态旅游者、护林员和巴拿马农民重叠的社会世界。在巴拿马的多个地点使用了参与性观察和录音访谈的传统人种学方法。STRI的项目集中在巴拿马中部的森林，它可以被视为一个“边界对象”，将多个社会世界联系在一起。边界对象对于几个相交的社会世界是有意义的。物体通过同时存在于多个世界而形成了多个世界之间的共同边界。这些对象保留了多个视点的痕迹，并满足了潜在的冲突集。企业家通过将代理人带入集体，架起了不同社会世界的桥梁。这些集体，以焦点物种或理论问题为导向，组成了广泛的盟友联盟。该研究项目寻求新的经验证据，以说明当多个集体和社会世界相互作用时，权力在工作中的动态。研究结果通过学术书籍长度的手稿和大众媒体上的文章传达给广泛的受众。项目负责人和共同负责人计划举办一次关于美洲生物多样性的研讨会，并开设一门由团队授课的本科科学研究课程。

This postdoctoral fellowship funded by the Science and Society Program and the Biology Directorate supports advanced training for Eben Kirksey under Geoffrey Bowker and Susan Leigh Star at Santa Clara University and ethnographic research at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama. Advanced tutorial training is received in five specific science studies literatures: interessement, social worlds, instrumentation, biodiversity, and infrastructure. The location of the training in northern California affords access to a broader science studies network, enabling the co-PI to stay abreast of cutting-edge scholarship by following a number of speaker series at the multiple campuses in the region.At the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) an array of scientific instruments and everyday technologies have been brought together to make plants, animals, and microbes relevant to human concerns. The ethnography involves study of the multiple scientific projects that coexist at STRI. This ethnography of a place - the rainforest of central Panama - explores the overlapping social worlds of scientists, parataxonomists, eco-tourists, forest rangers (guardabosques), and Panamanian farmers. Conventional ethnographic methods of participant observation and tape-recorded interviews are used at multiple locations in Panama. The projects at STRI focus on the forest of central Panama which may be viewed as a "boundary object" that unites multiple social worlds. Boundary objects are meaningful to several intersecting social worlds. Objects come to form a common boundary between multiple worlds by inhabiting them all simultaneously. These objects retain traces of multiple viewpoints and satisfy potentially conflicting sets of concerns. Entrepreneurs bridge different social worlds by bringing agents into collectives. These collectives, oriented around focal species or theoretical problems, assemble broad coalitions of allies. The research project seeks out new empirical evidence to illustrate the dynamics of power at work when multiple collectives and social worlds interact.The findings are communicated to broad audiences through an academic book length manuscript and articles in the popular media. The PI and co-PI plan a symposium on biodiversity in the Americas and a team-taught undergraduate science studies course.