Assessing Latour

The case of the sickle cell body in history

Dados Bibliográficos

ID2398198
AutoresSimon M Dyson (0000-0002-4735-2527, De Montfort University, Leicester, UK, autor correspondente)
Ano2019
Volume22
Fascículo2
Páginas212-230
Data de publicação2019-05-01
Peer ReviewedSim
Open AccessSim
TipoARTICLE
PeriódicoEuropean Journal of Social Theory (JOURNAL)
Identificadores do periódicoISSN: 1368-4310 • E-ISSN: 1461-7137
EditoraSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/1368431018754730
OpenAlexW2782214083
IdiomaEN
Citações recebidas2
Referências citadas48

The work of Bruno Latour has animated debates in sociology, anthropology and philosophy over several decades, while attracting criticisms of the ontological, epistemological and political implications of his focus on networks. This article takes a particular depth example - the case of the genetic condition of sickle cell - and, drawing upon anthropological, archaeological and sociological evidence of the sickle cell body in history, appraises early, and later, Latourian ideas. The article concludes that while methodologically useful in drawing attention to the complicated links of humans, animals and things, concerns remain about Latourian ontological claims. Limitations include an empiricist failure to account for absence; an insufficiently robust conception of emergence; an unwarranted curtailment of counterfactual human knowledge; a lack of concern for serial 'undeserving losers'; a tendency to accord excessive freedoms to human actors; and a lack of a conception of how things may be considered as agents rather than actants

Counterfactual thinking · Empiricism · Epistemology · Human body · Ontology · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Hemoglobinopathies and Related Disorders · Iron Metabolism and Disorders · Law · Philosophy · Race, Genetics, and Society