Katharine Legun
Biographic Data
| ID | 170687 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Katharine Legun |
| GIVEN NAMES | Katharine |
| FAMILY NAME | Legun |
| SIGNATURE | LEGUN K |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Otago |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-8238-6327 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 21 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 109 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 20 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2011 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2023 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Cultivating intellectual community in academia
Scholarship flourishes in inclusive environments where open deliberations and generative feedback expand both individual and collective thinking. Many researchers, however, have limited access to such settings, and most conventional academic conferences fall short of promises to provide them. We have written this Field Report to share our methods for cultivating a vibrant intellectual community within the Science and Technology Studies Food and A…
Social science – STEM collaborations in agriculture, food and beyond
Interdisciplinary research needs innovation. As an action-oriented intervention, this Manifesto begins from the authors' experiences as social scientists working within interdisciplinary science and technology collaborations in agriculture and food. We draw from these experiences to: 1) explain what social scientists contribute to interdisciplinary agri-food tech collaborations; (2) describe barriers to substantive and meaningful collaboration; a…
(Un)intended lock-in
Food systems transformations require coherent policies and improved understandings of the drivers and institutional dynamics that shape (un)sustainable food systems outcomes. In this paper, we introduce the Chilean National Organic Agriculture Law as a case of a policy process seeking to institutionalize a recognized pathway towards more sustainable food systems. Drawing from institutional theory we make visible multiple, and at times competing, …
Can a robot be an expert? The social meaning of skill and its expression through the prospect of autonomous AgTech
Artificial intelligence and robotics have increasingly been adopted in agri-food systems—from milking robots to self-driving tractors. New projects extend these technologies in an effort to automate skilled work that has previously been considered dependent on human expertise due to its complexity. In this paper, we draw on qualitative research carried out with farm managers on apple orchards and winegrape vineyards in Aotearoa New Zealand. We in…
Intellectual property meets transdisciplinary co-design
This paper explores the complex relationship between intellectual property (IP) and the transdisciplinary collaborative design (co-design) of new digital technologies for agriculture (AgTech). More specifically, it explores how prioritizing the capturing of IP as a central researcher responsibility can cause disruptions to research relationships and project outcomes. We argue that boundary-making processes associated with IP create a particular c…
Unravelling non-human agency in sustainability transitions
While agency has received considerable attention in recent sustainability transitions studies, as well as in the literature on socio-ecological systems and sustainability transformations, the focus has been on the agency of humans. Given the emphasis on infrastructures and material culture in sustainability transitions studies, it is surprising that non-human agency has not received more attention. This paper aims to add to the body of work on ag…
Robot-ready
With the growth of new collaborative design (co-design) strategies for technology development, and increasing media attention on future automation of the farm, food producers are aware of new robotics on the horizon. This paper will discuss how apple growers are anticipating new robotic technologies intended to use artificial intelligence (AI) to automate aspects of the farm, paying particular attention to the ways that anticipation relates to pr…
New aesthetic regimes
Overcoming Barriers to Including Agricultural Workers in the Co-Design of New AgTech
Collaborative design (co-design) is a design strategy for generating relevant and socially acceptable technologies, and is inherently political by nature of its inclusion of particular groups and interests. This paper explores how to ethically and responsibly prepare for, notice and overcome barriers to including agricultural workers in the co-design of new agricultural technologies. Drawing from feminist science and technology studies (STS), we …
The Cambridge Handbook of Environmental Sociology
The Cambridge Handbook of Environmental Sociology is a go-to resource for cutting-edge research in the field. This two-volume work covers the rich theoretic foundations of the sub-discipline, as well as novel approaches and emerging areas of research that add vitality and momentum to the discipline. Over the course of sixty chapters, the authors featured in this work reach new levels of theoretical depth, incorporating a global scope and diversit…
Accounting for account-abilities
Social sustainability indicators as performance
Sustainability programs and deliberative processes
When experts disagree
Introduction to the special issue on the post-human turn in agri-food studies
Desires, sorted
Ever-redder apples
This chapter discusses the destructive drive for aesthetic idealism that underlies the commodification of produce, and the tension it creates can be considered a feature of modern food systems. Redness in apples interacts with the human body. In the market, size and colour are the main ways to separate apples into price categories, and differentiating price. From the luminous apple that supplied Snow White with a dose of poison, to the apple that…
The second middle
Tiny trees for trendy produce
Club apples
Club apples are patented apple varieties, often grown by members of a co-operative who plan the production and marketing of the apples. Drawing on ethnographic work, this paper will use club apples as a case to demonstrate that varieties have shaped the development of the apple industry in ways that resist institutional pressures to commodify the biological features of the apple. Club apples extend social boundaries around varieties in ways that …
Cultivating Institutions
The practice of organic agriculture has recently grown and gained significant attention in many parts of the world. As alternative food systems proliferate into popular culture and take an increasingly large market share, social scientists from an array of disciplines have attempted to give meaning to the phenomenon. This article takes a unique approach to organic agriculture, by reframing it within the classical social theory of Tönnies and Durk…
Robot-ready
With the growth of new collaborative design (co-design) strategies for technology development, and increasing media attention on future automation of the farm, food producers are aware of new robotics on the horizon. This paper will discuss how apple growers are anticipating new robotic technologies intended to use artificial intelligence (AI) to automate aspects of the farm, paying particular attention to the ways that anticipation relates to pr…
Tiny trees for trendy produce
Club apples
Club apples are patented apple varieties, often grown by members of a co-operative who plan the production and marketing of the apples. Drawing on ethnographic work, this paper will use club apples as a case to demonstrate that varieties have shaped the development of the apple industry in ways that resist institutional pressures to commodify the biological features of the apple. Club apples extend social boundaries around varieties in ways that …
Social sustainability indicators as performance
Can a robot be an expert? The social meaning of skill and its expression through the prospect of autonomous AgTech
Artificial intelligence and robotics have increasingly been adopted in agri-food systems—from milking robots to self-driving tractors. New projects extend these technologies in an effort to automate skilled work that has previously been considered dependent on human expertise due to its complexity. In this paper, we draw on qualitative research carried out with farm managers on apple orchards and winegrape vineyards in Aotearoa New Zealand. We in…
Overcoming Barriers to Including Agricultural Workers in the Co-Design of New AgTech
Collaborative design (co-design) is a design strategy for generating relevant and socially acceptable technologies, and is inherently political by nature of its inclusion of particular groups and interests. This paper explores how to ethically and responsibly prepare for, notice and overcome barriers to including agricultural workers in the co-design of new agricultural technologies. Drawing from feminist science and technology studies (STS), we …
New aesthetic regimes
The second middle
Social science – STEM collaborations in agriculture, food and beyond
Interdisciplinary research needs innovation. As an action-oriented intervention, this Manifesto begins from the authors' experiences as social scientists working within interdisciplinary science and technology collaborations in agriculture and food. We draw from these experiences to: 1) explain what social scientists contribute to interdisciplinary agri-food tech collaborations; (2) describe barriers to substantive and meaningful collaboration; a…
Intellectual property meets transdisciplinary co-design
This paper explores the complex relationship between intellectual property (IP) and the transdisciplinary collaborative design (co-design) of new digital technologies for agriculture (AgTech). More specifically, it explores how prioritizing the capturing of IP as a central researcher responsibility can cause disruptions to research relationships and project outcomes. We argue that boundary-making processes associated with IP create a particular c…
Introduction to the special issue on the post-human turn in agri-food studies
(Un)intended lock-in
Food systems transformations require coherent policies and improved understandings of the drivers and institutional dynamics that shape (un)sustainable food systems outcomes. In this paper, we introduce the Chilean National Organic Agriculture Law as a case of a policy process seeking to institutionalize a recognized pathway towards more sustainable food systems. Drawing from institutional theory we make visible multiple, and at times competing, …
Accounting for account-abilities
Cultivating intellectual community in academia
Scholarship flourishes in inclusive environments where open deliberations and generative feedback expand both individual and collective thinking. Many researchers, however, have limited access to such settings, and most conventional academic conferences fall short of promises to provide them. We have written this Field Report to share our methods for cultivating a vibrant intellectual community within the Science and Technology Studies Food and A…
Desires, sorted
Cultivating Institutions
The practice of organic agriculture has recently grown and gained significant attention in many parts of the world. As alternative food systems proliferate into popular culture and take an increasingly large market share, social scientists from an array of disciplines have attempted to give meaning to the phenomenon. This article takes a unique approach to organic agriculture, by reframing it within the classical social theory of Tönnies and Durk…
Cultivating Institutions
The practice of organic agriculture has recently grown and gained significant attention in many parts of the world. As alternative food systems proliferate into popular culture and take an increasingly large market share, social scientists from an array of disciplines have attempted to give meaning to the phenomenon. This article takes a unique approach to organic agriculture, by reframing it within the classical social theory of Tönnies and Durk…
Tiny trees for trendy produce
Club apples
Club apples are patented apple varieties, often grown by members of a co-operative who plan the production and marketing of the apples. Drawing on ethnographic work, this paper will use club apples as a case to demonstrate that varieties have shaped the development of the apple industry in ways that resist institutional pressures to commodify the biological features of the apple. Club apples extend social boundaries around varieties in ways that …
Ever-redder apples
This chapter discusses the destructive drive for aesthetic idealism that underlies the commodification of produce, and the tension it creates can be considered a feature of modern food systems. Redness in apples interacts with the human body. In the market, size and colour are the main ways to separate apples into price categories, and differentiating price. From the luminous apple that supplied Snow White with a dose of poison, to the apple that…
The second middle
When experts disagree
Introduction to the special issue on the post-human turn in agri-food studies
Desires, sorted
Sustainability programs and deliberative processes
Social sustainability indicators as performance
The Cambridge Handbook of Environmental Sociology
The Cambridge Handbook of Environmental Sociology is a go-to resource for cutting-edge research in the field. This two-volume work covers the rich theoretic foundations of the sub-discipline, as well as novel approaches and emerging areas of research that add vitality and momentum to the discipline. Over the course of sixty chapters, the authors featured in this work reach new levels of theoretical depth, incorporating a global scope and diversit…
Accounting for account-abilities
Unravelling non-human agency in sustainability transitions
While agency has received considerable attention in recent sustainability transitions studies, as well as in the literature on socio-ecological systems and sustainability transformations, the focus has been on the agency of humans. Given the emphasis on infrastructures and material culture in sustainability transitions studies, it is surprising that non-human agency has not received more attention. This paper aims to add to the body of work on ag…
Robot-ready
With the growth of new collaborative design (co-design) strategies for technology development, and increasing media attention on future automation of the farm, food producers are aware of new robotics on the horizon. This paper will discuss how apple growers are anticipating new robotic technologies intended to use artificial intelligence (AI) to automate aspects of the farm, paying particular attention to the ways that anticipation relates to pr…
New aesthetic regimes
Overcoming Barriers to Including Agricultural Workers in the Co-Design of New AgTech
Collaborative design (co-design) is a design strategy for generating relevant and socially acceptable technologies, and is inherently political by nature of its inclusion of particular groups and interests. This paper explores how to ethically and responsibly prepare for, notice and overcome barriers to including agricultural workers in the co-design of new agricultural technologies. Drawing from feminist science and technology studies (STS), we …
Can a robot be an expert? The social meaning of skill and its expression through the prospect of autonomous AgTech
Artificial intelligence and robotics have increasingly been adopted in agri-food systems—from milking robots to self-driving tractors. New projects extend these technologies in an effort to automate skilled work that has previously been considered dependent on human expertise due to its complexity. In this paper, we draw on qualitative research carried out with farm managers on apple orchards and winegrape vineyards in Aotearoa New Zealand. We in…
Intellectual property meets transdisciplinary co-design
This paper explores the complex relationship between intellectual property (IP) and the transdisciplinary collaborative design (co-design) of new digital technologies for agriculture (AgTech). More specifically, it explores how prioritizing the capturing of IP as a central researcher responsibility can cause disruptions to research relationships and project outcomes. We argue that boundary-making processes associated with IP create a particular c…
Cultivating intellectual community in academia
Scholarship flourishes in inclusive environments where open deliberations and generative feedback expand both individual and collective thinking. Many researchers, however, have limited access to such settings, and most conventional academic conferences fall short of promises to provide them. We have written this Field Report to share our methods for cultivating a vibrant intellectual community within the Science and Technology Studies Food and A…
Social science – STEM collaborations in agriculture, food and beyond
Interdisciplinary research needs innovation. As an action-oriented intervention, this Manifesto begins from the authors' experiences as social scientists working within interdisciplinary science and technology collaborations in agriculture and food. We draw from these experiences to: 1) explain what social scientists contribute to interdisciplinary agri-food tech collaborations; (2) describe barriers to substantive and meaningful collaboration; a…
(Un)intended lock-in
Food systems transformations require coherent policies and improved understandings of the drivers and institutional dynamics that shape (un)sustainable food systems outcomes. In this paper, we introduce the Chilean National Organic Agriculture Law as a case of a policy process seeking to institutionalize a recognized pathway towards more sustainable food systems. Drawing from institutional theory we make visible multiple, and at times competing, …
Political science (16 works) · Sociology (15 works) · Business (12 works) · Economics (10 works) · Organic Food and Agriculture (10 works) · Ecology (9 works) · Biology (8 works) · Engineering (8 works) · Social science (8 works) · Agriculture (7 works)