Avenali Lectures

Bruno Latour, Avenali Chair in the Humanities 1999-2000

“The End of Nature as a Way to Organize our Polity” || April 11, 2000

Bruno Latour’s work, unique in its incorporation of philosophy and anthropology, continues to reflect his early training and experience in the two fields. Professor at the Centre de Sociologie de l’Innovation at the Ecole des Mines in Paris and Visiting Professor at the London School of Economics, Latour received a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Tours in 1975. He carried out initial field work in Africa and California, specializing in the analysis of scientists and engineers at work. His first book, Laboratory Life: The Construction of Scientific Facts (English edition from Princeton University Press, 1979), is a classic example of the use of ethnographic methods to describe the daily functioning of a science laboratory in California.

Continuing research that combined philosophy, history, sociology, and anthropology of science, Latour has collaborated in a number of studies in science policy and research management. Science in Action (1987) and The Pasteurization of France (1988) are noteworthy examples of his publication in this area. In 1992, he turned his attention to an automatic subway system (Aramis or the Love of Technology), and in 1999 to what he calls an “essay in symmetric anthropology” (We Have Never Been Modern). Pandora’s Hope: Essays in the Reality of Science Studies also was published in 1999.

Other Events with Bruno Latour

“Bringing the Sciences into Democracy” || April 18, 2000