Standards and Their Stories How Quantifying, Classifying, and Formalizing Practices Shape Everyday Life
Language: English
Published by Cornell Univ Pr, 2009
- Softcover
- New
Seller: Revaluation Books, Exeter, United KingdomRevaluation Books
AbeBooks seller since January 6, 2003
Condition: New
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Add to basketItem description from seller
1st edition. 264 pages. 9.00x6.25x0.75 inches. In Stock.
Seller Inventory # x-0801474612
- Title
- Standards and Their Stories How Quantifying, Classifying, and Formalizing Practices Shape Everyday Life
- Author
- Star, Susan Leigh (Editor)/ Lampland, Martha (Editor)
- Publisher
- Cornell Univ Pr
- Publication year
- 2009
- Condition
- Brand New
- Binding
- Paperback
- Language
- English
- ISBN 10
- 0801474612
- ISBN 13
- 9780801474613
- Item weight
- 0.41 kilograms
Standardization is one of the defining aspects of modern life, its presence so pervasive that it is usually taken for granted. However cumbersome, onerous, or simply puzzling certain standards may be, their fundamental purpose in streamlining procedures, regulating behaviors, and predicting results is rarely questioned. Indeed, the invisibility of infrastructure and the imperative of standardizing processes signify their absolute necessity. Increasingly, however, social scientists are beginning to examine the origins and effects of the standards that underpin the technology and practices of everyday life.Standards and Their Stories explores how we interact with the network of standards that shape our lives in ways both obvious and invisible. The main chapters analyze standardization in biomedical research, government bureaucracies, the insurance industry, labor markets, and computer technology, providing detailed accounts of the invention of "standard humans" for medical testing and life insurance actuarial tables, the imposition of chronological age as a biographical determinant, the accepted means of determining labor productivity, the creation of international standards for the preservation and access of metadata, and the global consequences of "ASCII imperialism" and the use of English as the lingua franca of the Internet.Accompanying these in-depth critiques are a series of examples that depict an almost infinite variety of standards, from the controversies surrounding the European Union's supposed regulation of banana curvature to the minimum health requirements for immigrants at Ellis Island, conflicting (and ever-increasing) food portion sizes, and the impact of standardized punishment metrics like "Three Strikes" laws. The volume begins with a pioneering essay from Susan Leigh Star and Martha Lampland on the nature of standards in everyday life that brings together strands from the several fields represented in the book. In an appendix, the editors provide a guide for teaching courses in this emerging interdisciplinary field, which they term "infrastructure studies," making Standards and Their Stories ideal for scholars, students, and those curious about why coffins are becoming wider, for instance, or why the Financial Accounting Standards Board refused to classify September 11 as an "extraordinary" event.
"Synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
About the Author
Martha Lampland is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of California, San Diego. She is the author of The Object of Labor and coeditor of Altering States. Susan Leigh Star is Research Professor, Center for Science, Technology, and Society, Santa Clara University. She is the author of books including Sorting Things Out and editor of The Cultures of Computing.
"About the title" may belong to another edition of this title.
Revaluation Books
Exeter, United Kingdom
AbeBooks seller since January 6, 2003
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