Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Quantification of Geography and Social Relations in Agrarian Reforms

该奖项支持的研究调查了如何在农村土地改革项目中量化土地和其他资源。土地改革重新分配了获得初级生产资源的机会。这种重新分配严重依赖于测量和计算，而测量和计算在不同情况下可能会有很大差异。 研究人员试图了解这些数字是如何产生的，以及它们是如何被纳入政府规划和设计的。这项研究之所以重要，是因为从全国人口普查到教育测试，各种量化已经成为当代生活的一个共同部分。这项研究的重点是实际数字产生的微观过程以及谁产生了这些数字。这些信息将帮助使用数字做出重要决策的政策制定者和受这些决策影响的公民更好地理解量化背后的复杂性。这项研究将由密歇根大学人类学博士生盛龙承担，他由埃里克·穆格勒博士指导。龙永图将中国农村土地改革作为一个案例进行研究。这个重大的国家量化项目提供了一个丰富和独特的机会，将不会在美国，虽然她的研究结果将适用于美国龙将调查农村居民和其他社会行为者如何衡量和计算农业资源。她用两组问题来组织她的研究。第一个是数字治理。社会行动者--农民、官僚、政府工作人员和测量员--如何在土地改革中单独或合作地产生数字？第二组问题是关于人格和财产的量化。人们如何操纵产生社会标签的数字标准？当他们将社会角色从家庭转移到社区时，他们如何根据上下文计算土地？Long将在三个主要地点收集数据：村庄家庭和农田; GIS调查公司;家庭和机构档案。研究结果将有助于通过数字的透镜对社会范畴和关系进行跨学科的理论化。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The research supported by this award investigates how land and other resources are quantified in rural land reform projects. Land reforms reallocate access to primary productive resources. This reallocation critically depends on measurements and calculations that can vary significantly from one context to another. The researcher seeks to understand how these numbers are produced and how they are incorporated into governmental planning and design. The research is important because quantifications of all kinds, from national censuses to educational testing, have become a common part of contemporary life. This research focuses on the micro-processes by which the actual numbers are produced and who produces them. This information will help both policy makers who use numbers to make important decisions and citizens whose lives are affected by those decisions to better understand the complexities that can lie behind quantifications.The research will be undertaken by Sheng Long, a University of Michigan anthropology doctoral student, who is supervised by Dr. Erik Mueggler. Long will use rural land reform in China as a case study. This major national quantification project provides a rich and unique opportunity that would not be available in the United States, although the results of her study will be applicable to the U.S. Long will investigate how rural residents and other social actors measure and calculate agricultural resources. She has structured her research with two sets of queries. The first set is about numerical governance. How do social actors--farmers, bureaucrats, government staff, and surveyors--produce numbers, individually and cooperatively, in land reforms? The second set of questions is about the quantification of personhood and belongings. How do people manipulate numerical standards that generate social labeling? How do they calculate land contextually when they shift social roles from household to neighborhood to community? Long will collect data in three major sites: village households and agricultural fields; a GIS survey company; and familial and institutional archives. Findings from the research will contribute to interdisciplinary theorization of social category and relations through the lens of numbers. It also will provide data for policymakers worldwide who need to understand how local population are drawn into, affect, and are affected by large-scale quantification projects.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.