ANTH245 2007-10-01: Difference between revisions
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** Note that here the denial of the native point of view does not strike as ethically problematic (as it did with Rappaport) | ** Note that here the denial of the native point of view does not strike as ethically problematic (as it did with Rappaport) | ||
* What are the "real" procedures? | * What are the "real" procedures? | ||
** The description derived from looking at the transcripts and other empirical data | |||
* So ... two kinds of description | * So ... two kinds of description | ||
** A: Formal -- Standard Procedures; flowchart | ** A: Formal -- Standard Procedures; flowchart | ||
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| Folktale → Templates | | Folktale → Templates | ||
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| Plans and Procedures | |||
| Practical action | |||
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Revision as of 00:00, 3 October 2007
Business
- The Midterm is available on Blackboard
- Please send in your responses on time
Recap
- What is Coding?
- The process of converting texts into codes
- A kind of transduction
- A kind of reductionism
- informal → formal
- A : B :: Text : Code :: Discourse : Ontology
- The reduction of A to B is structuralism
Segue
- Structuralism = Cognitive Science
- Just as information culture represents text as code, CogSci represents activity as plan
- Activity = ritual, work, practice = parole, event
Intro
- We are now officially turning the tables -- from "culture as information" to "information as culture"
- We will explore continuities and discontinuities between the two approaches
- Path:
- Computer as metaphor
- Computer as tool
- Computer as artifact
- Next week: Expanding the scope
Suchman 1983
Background
- Description of Lucy Suchman
- One of the pioneers of "corporate anthropology," but from a critical perspective
- Sets the method:
- Office as ethnographic site -- "village"
- Computer as core artifact -- the "churinga"
- Work as ritual
- What are the symbols and myths?
- discourse, planning tools, documents
- Management and Labor
Procedures
- What is the problem? The status of formal procedures ...
- The "natives" view procedures as a description of work
- But the anthropologist sees things otherwise
- Note that here the denial of the native point of view does not strike as ethically problematic (as it did with Rappaport)
- What are the "real" procedures?
- The description derived from looking at the transcripts and other empirical data
- So ... two kinds of description
- A: Formal -- Standard Procedures; flowchart
- B: Informal -- Ethnographic (thick) description; narrative
- Comparisons:
| Author | A (Formal) | B (Informal) |
| Bateson | Purposive Mind | Greater Mind |
| Rappaport | Cognitive Models | Environment → Operational Models |
| Levi-Strauss | Myth → Structure | Event |
| Colby | Folktale → Templates | Experience |
| Suchman | Plans and Procedures | Practical action |
Suchman 1988, part 1
- Ethnomethodology
- Method: to study representations of work and the work of representations
AI
- Compare to behaviorism
- Considers mentalist concepts without introspection
- Instead, the computer serves as an objective model for thinking
- Brain = Computer, Mind = disembodied Pattern
- Difference between organic and silicon substrates not relevant
The Turing Test and ELIZA
Suchman 1988, part 2
- Whiteboard as "cultural model" (Colby)
Forsythe 1993
- Knowledge engineering
- Representation of work
- Compare to coding
