Wikipedia:WikiProject Council/Proposals/STS


 * The following discussion is an archived proposal of the WikiProject below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the project's talk page (if created) or the WikiProject Council).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The proposed WikiProject was not created

Description
Science and Technology Studies (STS) (Also called Science, Technology, and Society) is an interdisciplinary academic field of social sciences and the humanities that studies science, technology, and the social systems that surround them from historical, anthropological, sociological, and philosophical perspectives (among other approaches). It's been an established field for several years with multiple university departments, scholars, academic societies, and journals.

Scope and important/sample pages
WikiProject STS currently would seem to have a scope of over 1,000 articles, given the number of articles which link to the main page. Many of the core articles are currently under-developed and have multiple issues, including a lack of inline citations and reliance on "further reading" sections. A selection of articles on the project that exist right now would be:

Fields of inquiry

 * Science and Technology Studies
 * History and Philosophy of Science - a related field, sometimes considered distinct and sometimes coincident with STS.
 * History of technology
 * Science Studies
 * Engineering studies
 * Economics of science
 * &c.

Concepts/Theory

 * Social construction of technology
 * Actor-network theory
 * Strong Programme
 * &c.

Key Scholars
Main Category: Category:Science_and_technology_studies_scholars
 * Bruno Latour
 * Sheila Jasanoff
 * Donna Haraway
 * Trevor Pinch
 * Steve Fuller
 * Langdon Winner
 * Lucy Suchman
 * Helen Verran
 * &c.

Info Box & Portal
It'd be great to create an STS infobox, or at least a "part of a series on ..." box. STS's presence on Wikipedia would also benefit from an STS portal.

STS template
We'd also take over the editing of our template:

More articles
Further articles can be viewed at (currently 77 pages) and Special:WhatLinksHere/Science, technology and society.

Relation to Existing WikiProjects
The proposed project would be distinct from WikiProject History of Science, which has mostly been covering STS-related topics for a while. While many STS scholars and articles fall within the scope of that project, there are many scholars who are not historians, and might be better served by a project which focuses on STS topics. It would probably be best if the potential WikiProject STS and the established WikiProject HoS were considered sister projects, with HoS being the elder sister with experience and expertise. Ideally, the proposed project could attract new editors to HoS and help with HoS's goals.

We'd also be relevant to WikiProject Science and WikiProject Technology though it's unclear what exactly our relationship to them would be. Generally, STS scholars could help provide contextual sections on existing Science and Technology articles, though that is already mostly covered within the scope of those projects. Where we could really be helpful is by providing additional information and analysis of particular sciences and technologies from STS scholars.


 * List of WikiProjects currently on the talk pages of those articles
 * Please invite these and any other similar groups to join the discussion about this proposal. See WikiProject_Council/Directory to find similar WikiProjects.



Support
Also, specify whether or not you would join the project.
 * 1) Mathmitch7 (talk) 03:08, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 2) (would join) Bondegezou (talk) 10:49, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
 * 3) Would probably join. Zazpot (talk) 22:29, 23 April 2018 (UTC)
 * 4) Would join --DiasporaCryptid (talk) 18:21, 12 October 2018 (UTC)
 * 5) Would join Qzekrom 💬 theythem 06:41, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * 6) Would join --Ingmar.lippert (talk) 14:24, 2 August 2019 (UTC)

Discussion

 * Comment: Seems excessively specific. In what way are WP:WikiProject Technology and the various science wikiprojects failing? We don't need a wikiproject devoted to every synchretic thing someone somewhere teaches a class in.  There are innumerable intersections of various fields, and we still cover them under broader-topic wikiprojects that pool sufficient editors to (we hope) actually get anything done.  This sounds like a joint taskforce/workgroup of WP:TECH and WP:WikiProject Science.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ &gt;ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ&lt;  03:43, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Check out the updates I've made to the page since opening it and tell me if this is still your opinion Mathmitch7 (talk) 03:56, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Science and technology studies is not the intersection of science and technology, nor is it a syncretic thing. STS is a branch of social science: the existing WikiProject it best fits under is WikiProject Sociology. ( has alerted that WikiProject to this proposal.) Bondegezou (talk) 14:51, 16 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I'll buy that, though it should also probably be listed as a "child" of some other projects like tech and science and history of science. Anyway, if even the broader and more well-established philosophy of science field doesn't have a separate project (subsumed under the history of science project), this doesn't need one either.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  04:28, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
 * I do not agree with STS falling under sociology at all. The reason is that STS is precisely not a disciplinary subfield but a highly interdisciplinary field, as much drawing on and enricjhing sociology, cultural anthropology as philosophy and history (to name a few). STS is better understood as a 'studies' field, similar to Gender Studies. Ingmar.lippert (talk) 14:31, 2 August 2019 (UTC)


 * Comment: I'm generally supportive of this initiative, especially if there is critical mass of interest to launch and sustain it. Perhaps a good place to start and demonstrate that interest is with a dedicated effort to improve the main page, which needs quite a bit of work, in my opinion. I'm not sure there's a need to "take over" the STS navbox; if there are suggestions for improving it, please post on that article's talk page. Thanks, DA Sonnenfeld (talk) 11:58, 18 November 2017 (UTC)


 * Comment: Given the general lack of interest, I'm thinking that it might make more sense to organize this as a taskforce instead, under WP:HISTSCI probably (as they're currently the closest project), potentially jointly under other projects (especially WP:Sociology. What do folks think? - - mathmitch7 (talk/contribs) 19:12, 9 May 2018 (UTC)
 * Support task force I've been interested in forming a tech ethics task force myself; it would be under WP:TECH instead, though. I think these ideas are similar enough to be one group. Qzekrom 💬 theythem 06:37, 9 April 2019 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the project's talk page (if created) or at the WikiProject Council). No further edits should be made to this page.