Self-Tracking Entanglements and Critical Practices: A New Materialist Approach to Digital Health Technologies

自我追踪纠葛和关键实践：数字健康技术的新唯物主义方法

• 批准号: 1904297
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Edinburgh
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2017
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2017 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-1904297
• 关键词: Self; Tracking; Entanglements; Critical; Practices

Informed by the conceptual streams of new materialism(s) and situated within the field of Critical Digital Health Studies, I look at intersecting themes of embodiment, human-technology-data intra-actions, health, and performativity by mobilising sophisticated theoretical resources and rich qualitative methodologies. My project is structured around two pairs of questions: 1)How do particular configurations of self-tracking (S-T) apparatuses emerge? How.do they influence the cultivation and embodied performance of health-orientated subjectivities?2)How is the body rendered through entangled performative enactments of S-T? How are these articulations of the body challenged, modified, or subverted through 'critical' practices of S-T?Addressing a number of calls in the relevant literature, I apply and expand on complex sociomaterialist approaches to better understand the social and embodied implications arising from the development of S-T technologies in relation to the subversive techniques of S-T individuals that modify, challenge or resist dominant understandings of the body encouraged through conventional usage of these technologies.Problematising the dominant understanding of these technologies and their usage, I suggest that S-T practices do not uncover qualities of a pre-existing body but rather are partially constitutive of the body and how the individual comes to understand themselves. The practical problem I wish to unpick is the nature of how S-T technologies are implicated in this nexus of pre-defined, neoliberal 'body projects' from a perspective that accounts for the relational, co-constitutive interactions between flesh, technology and wider semiotic-material forces. Ultimately, I seek to investigate individual instances of critical S-T practices that inform the production of alternative 'body projects' which contest dominant narratives of the fit, healthy body commonly promoted through consumer S-T technologies.To understand the relationship between the technologies of S-T and the body as defined by my central research questions, a focus on the entangled development of such technologies, involving the agential intra-action of, among other elements, programmers, designers, marketers, medical professionals, algorithms, data protection laws, and app stores, is required. As such, the first core focus of my research will be to explore the processes through which tracked data is visualised and conceptualised into actionable knowledge. From this, how this produced knowledge is used to prescribe particular modes of behaviour and contribute to different understandings of the self and the body.The relations between technology and the body are not coherent or linear, nor are the relational performances of S-T, but instead they emerge through a chaotic entanglement of factors that differ in each individual experience. Consequently, the second focus of my research centres around the tensions, negotiations, and subversions that are present in S-T practices between the body and technology. Through engaging with the dynamic array of bodies, technologies, and discourses to explore how they coalesce, stabilise and become realised through the iterative performances of S-T, I wish to articulate how the cultivation of a multiplicity of bodies is made possible through the critical, performative coupling of individuals and S-T technologies.Methodologically, I am committed to a broader practice of analytical "reverse engineering" (Fox, 2015), I will use a multi-method methodology to split S-T entanglements to explore how bodies, technologies, and discourses materialise through relational, intra-active performances. This approach consists of three focused engagements-human bodies in performances of self-tracking; S-T software and hardware; and developers of S-T technologies-that seek to investigate the differing but relational practices that are mutually produced through the engagements of each co-constitutive component.

通过新唯物主义的概念流和位于关键数字健康研究领域内，我通过调动复杂的理论资源和丰富的定性方法来研究体现，人类技术数据内部行动，健康和表演性的交叉主题。我的项目围绕两对问题展开：1）自我跟踪（S-T）装置的特定配置是如何出现的？How.do它们影响健康导向主体性的培养和体现表现？2)身体是如何通过S-T的纠结的表演性制定来呈现的？这些身体的表达是如何通过S-T的“批判性”实践而受到挑战、修改或颠覆的？在解决相关文献中的一些问题时，我应用并扩展了复杂的社会物质主义方法，以更好地理解S-T技术的发展所产生的社会和具体影响，这些技术与S-T个体的颠覆性技术有关，挑战或抵制通过传统使用这些技术所鼓励的对身体的主流理解。质疑对这些技术的主流理解和他们的用法，我认为，S-T实践并没有揭示一个预先存在的身体的素质，而是身体的部分组成部分，以及个人如何来理解自己。我希望解开的实际问题是，从一个解释肉体、技术和更广泛的符号物质力量之间的关系、共同构成的相互作用的角度来看，科技技术是如何被牵连到这个预先定义的、新自由主义的“身体项目”的关系中的。最后，我试图调查关键的S-T实践的个体实例，这些实践为替代性“身体项目”的生产提供了信息，这些项目与通过消费者S-T技术推广的健康身体的主导叙述相竞争。为了理解S-T技术与身体之间的关系，正如我的中心研究问题所定义的那样，关注这些技术的纠缠发展，需要涉及程序员、设计师、营销人员、医疗专业人员、算法、数据保护法和应用程序商店等的代理内部行动。因此，我研究的第一个核心重点将是探索跟踪数据可视化和概念化为可操作知识的过程。从这一点出发，这种产生的知识如何被用来规定特定的行为模式，并有助于对自我和身体的不同理解。技术和身体之间的关系不是连贯的或线性的，S-T的关系表现也不是，而是通过每个个体经验中不同因素的混乱纠缠而出现的。因此，我的研究的第二个重点是围绕着身体和技术之间的紧张关系，谈判和颠覆。通过参与身体、技术和话语的动态阵列，探索它们如何通过S-T的迭代表现而结合、稳定和实现，我希望阐明如何通过个人和S-T技术的批判性、表演性耦合来培养多种身体。（福克斯，2015），我将使用多方法的方法来分裂S-T纠缠，探索身体，技术和话语如何通过关系实现，互动表演。这种方法包括三个重点的成果-人体在自我跟踪的性能; S-T软件和硬件;和S-T技术的开发人员，旨在调查不同的，但相互关系的做法，通过每个共同组成部分的参与产生。