From Galton's Pride to Du Bois's Pursuit

The Formats of Data-Driven Inequality

Datos Bibliográficos

ID2353239
AutoresColin Koopman (0000-0003-0354-7522, University of Oregon, autor de correspondencia)
Año2024
Volumen41
Número1
Páginas59-78
Fecha de publicación2024-01-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaTheory Culture & Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0263-2764 • E-ISSN: 1460-3616
EditorialSAGE Publishing (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/02632764231162251
OpenAlexW4366826074
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas1
Referencias citadas30

Data increasingly drive our lives. Often presented as a new trajectory, the deep immersion of our lives in data has a history that is well over a century old. By revisiting the work of early pioneers of what would today be called data science, we can bring into view both assumptions that fund our data-driven moment as well as alternative relations to data. I here excavate insights by contrasting a seemingly unlikely pair of early data technologists, Francis Galton and W.E.B. Du Bois. Galton, well known for his contributions to eugenics, was first and foremost a tinkering technician of measure. There are numerous domains of science over which Galtonian conceptions retain considerable influence, presumably without his pride in racial inequality. A more viable, because more egalitarian, alternative for the present can be found in the early data work of Du Bois

Eugenics · Galton's problem · Genealogy · Inequality · Political science · Pride · Sociology · Computer Science · Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice · Data Analysis and Archiving · History · Law · Mathematics · Race, Genetics, and Society