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Hacker Cultures: The Conference Podcast
As Covid-19 turned most conferences virtual, so to combat Zoom-fatigue, at 4S/EASST 2020 we decided to try another format and turn a conference session into a podcast. Among hundreds of panels, papers and sessions, our panels rounded up all sorts of researchers who study what it is to be a hacker, and what hacking, programming, tinkering and working with computers is all about. We have continued biennally for full three seasons.
The newest season comes to you from the 2024 join Society for Social Studies of Science/European Association for the Study of Science and Technology conference (4S/EASST) in Amsterdam, titled "Making and Doing Transformations".
The second series was from EASST 2022 titled "The Politics of Technoscientific Futures" held in Madrid in July 2022. Our panel was titled "Hacking Everything. The cultures and politics of hackers and software workers". The first series was from 4S/EASST in "virtual Prague" in August 2020, titled "Locating and Timing Matters: Significance and agency of STS in emerging worlds".
We the hosts are Paula Bialski, who is an Associate Professor at the University of St. Gallen, Andreas Bischof who is a Research Group Leader at Chemnitz University of Technology, and Mace Ojala, a PhD scholar at Ruhr-University Bochum. Audio production by Heights Beats at Hotmilk Records. The theme track of first series is "Rocky" by Paula & Karol. Heights Beats produced the theme track of the second series. Funding for the editing of this first series comes from University of St. Gallen, the second from Chemnitz University of Technology.
Hacker Cultures: The Conference Podcast
Episode 1 (2020): Morgan G. Ames - Throwback Culture: The Role of Nostalgia in Hacker Worlds
This session's guest is Morgan G. Ames, who joins us from UC Berkely. There she is an assistant adjunct professor in the School of Information and interim associate director of research for the Center for Science, Technology, Medicine and Society.
The maintenance of ‘hacker’ identities often involves the discussion of one’s origin story—the nostalgic rendering of the path that one took into programming and technical tinkering, involving the technologies and media of hackers’ childhoods. In her paper she explores the ways in which these memories are mobilized to do cultural work in contemporary technology worlds, especially among those creating computational devices and software for children. Origin stories can serve as gatekeepers within hacker circles, delimiting who is a good “culture fit.” It can moreover shape the design process by influencing who hackers view as their primary audience and what they think this audience will find captivating.