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A story of nimble knowledge production in an era of academic capitalism
Theory and Society ( IF 3.226 ) Pub Date : 2020-11-05 , DOI: 10.1007/s11186-020-09422-0
Steve G. Hoffman

A rise of academic capitalism over the past four decades has been well documented within many research-intensive universities. Largely missing, however, are in-depth studies of how particularly situated academic groups manage the uncertainties that come with intermittent and fickle commercial funding streams in their daily research practice and problem choice. To capture the strategies scientists adopt under these conditions, this article provides an ethnographically detailed (and true) story about how a single project in Artificial Intelligence grew over several years from a peripheral idea to the very center of an academic lab’s commercial portfolio. The analysis theorizes an epistemic form—nimble knowledge production—and documents three of its lab-level features: 1) rapid prototyping to keep sunk costs low, 2) shared search for “real world problems” rather than “theoretical” ones, and 3) nimble commitment to research problem choice. While similar forms of academic knowledge transfer have been lauded as “mode 2,” “innovative,” or “hybrid” for initiating cross-institutional collaboration and pushing science beyond disciplinary silos, this case suggests it can rely on fleeting attention to problems resistant to a quick fix.

中文翻译:

学术资本主义时代敏捷知识生产的故事

过去四年间学术资本主义的兴起已在许多研究密集型大学中得到充分证明。然而,在很大程度上缺少对特殊情况的学术团体如何管理其日常研究实践和问题选择中间歇性和善变的商业资金流带来的不确定性的深入研究。为了捕捉科学家在这些条件下采用的策略,本文提供了一个人种学详细(且真实)的故事,讲述了人工智能中的单个项目如何在几年内从外围想法发展为学术实验室商业投资组合的核心。该分析对一种认知形式——灵活的知识生产——进行了理论化,并记录了其实验室级的三个特征:1)快速原型制作以保持低沉没成本,2) 共同搜索“现实世界问题”而不是“理论”问题,以及 3) 对研究问题选择的灵活承诺。虽然类似形式的学术知识转移被称赞为“模式 2”、“创新”或“混合”,用于启动跨机构合作和推动科学超越学科孤岛,但这个案例表明,它可以依靠对抗拒问题的短暂关注。快速修复。
更新日期:2020-11-05
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