Committee for the Anthropology of Science, Technology, and Computing, part of the GAD of the American Anthropological Association | castac.org |https://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.socialhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mtx3juk6os2dIn June, emerging STS scholars gathered in Seoul to workshop draft manuscripts, encountering charismatic objects and a "concrete fish tank". Lachlan Hensey reflects on the 2026 ST&HV STS School. New on Platypus. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/08/dispatch-from-seoul-reflections-on-the-science-technology-human-values-science-and-technology-studies-school-june-2026/26 Aug 2026 00:33 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mtx3juk6os2dhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mtme7ndkr22wToday on the blog, Tanu Biswas revisits the Boaventura de Sousa Santos case through autoethnography, interrogating her own response to encountering a citation of de Sousa Santos' work. New on Platypus. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/08/in-the-pensive-pause-of-supervision-a-footnote-on-citing-santos/21 Aug 2026 18:09 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mtme7ndkr22whttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mthymmsgns2nHow can medicalization create spaces for women to freely explore their sexuality? New on Platypus, Neslihan Sen uses vaginismus as a lens in Turkey to analyze the paradoxical relationship between sexual agency and the medicalization of sexuality. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/08/from-candle-to-dilator-treating-vaginismus-in-turkey/20 Aug 2026 00:31 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mthymmsgns2nhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mtck4cmdfc2gIn Networks of Knowledge Sharing, Jennifer Foley shares her personal journey of exploring mycelial logics and how they resonate with her experiences of resource sharing, writing, care work, and decentralized collaboration in academic spaces. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/08/networks-of-knowledge-sharing-becoming-with-mushrooms-in-academia/17 Aug 2026 20:28 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mtck4cmdfc2ghttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3msxtzun7hc2nToday on Platypus, Megan MacGregor examines at-home "smart bathroom" technologies, showing how visions for continuous microbiome monitoring emerge from the human genome sequencing era and its focus on personalized medicine. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/08/microbiome-monitoring-smart-toilets-precision-medicine-and-the-post-genomic-bowel/13 Aug 2026 14:27 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3msxtzun7hc2nhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3msqgai4wx22dCan data centers learn to sweat? New on Platypus, Miriam Fahimi explores AI, heat, and cooling, asking what alternative futures for computing might look like. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/08/can-a-data-center-sweat/ Project: cryocultures.org10 Aug 2026 15:31 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3msqgai4wx22dhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3msf6acv2jk2xWhat does it take to return to a field site, year after year? Mayline Strouk traces the fragile alignments between seabirds, researchers, and funding that sustain long-term ecological monitoring in Iceland. https://blog.castac.org/2026/08/fragile-followings-leaving-and-returning-to-the-ecological-field/06 Aug 2026 04:09 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3msf6acv2jk2xhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3msdks3joek2qThe first post in Labor Tech India's series on Platypus presents union organisers' perspectives on researchers' contributions to movement spaces, with suggestions to minimize research fatigue and facilitate collaborative engagements.05 Aug 2026 12:48 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3msdks3joek2qhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mrx6pxnnrs2zWhat do AI systems miss when they learn African languages? New on Platypus, Mpho Primus and Siri Lamoureaux explore why language is more than text - and why context, culture, and relationships matter for ethical AI. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/07/automating-language-losing-relationality-feminist-reflections-on-african-language-ai/31 Jul 2026 14:40 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mrx6pxnnrs2zhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mrpkyitk322kWhy aren't disease "hotspots" neutral descriptions of who is getting sick? New on Platypus, Katharina Rynkiewich examines the U.S. measles outbreak alongside frontline healthcare providers in South Florida to show how hotspot maps are sociotechnical and political objects.28 Jul 2026 13:58 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mrpkyitk322khttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mrb4ds5wo22xWhat does it mean to feel stuck when your field has already succeeded? New on Platypus, Sumin Myung follows South Korean forest scientists confronting a professional anxiety rooted in the very success of the country's reforestation since the 1970s. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/07/stuck-among-the-trees/22 Jul 2026 19:59 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mrb4ds5wo22xhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mr45mdsnjk2eToday on Platypus, @abhigya.bsky.social discusses contestations around the EU Nature Restoration Law in Czechia and shows how these debates highlight the contradictions of interest-group mobilisation in scientific controversies. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/07/charting-the-discourse-of-nature-restoration-the-eu-nature-restoration-law-in-the-public-sphere-in-czechia/20 Jul 2026 20:38 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mr45mdsnjk2ehttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mqrpe6w4g222In League of Legends, the economy doesn't end at Riot's store. New on Platypus, Iván Flores follows the informal markets for skins, accounts, and coaching that make up its "digital porosity" - proof that corporate platforms are powerful, but never fully closed.16 Jul 2026 16:57 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mqrpe6w4g222https://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mqp2kvv6dk2lAt Mumbai's Deonar dumping ground, the monster is not a swamp man. It is the unstable assemblage of plastics, marsh, damaged ecologies, and the labor of those who work there. New on Platypus, Adwaita Banerjee follows the ground that moves. Read and listen: https://blog.castac.org/2026/07/the-monsters-we-buried-plastics-swamp-men-and-the-unquiet-ground-of-deonar/15 Jul 2026 15:39 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mqp2kvv6dk2lhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mqa4icgp522eAI will transform education. We've heard that for decades. New on Platypus, Martin Oliver and Jade Vu Henry use the lenticular cloud - stationary in appearance, constituted by continuous movement - to rethink EdTech's stuckness as a practice of repair rather than a failure of progress.09 Jul 2026 17:04 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mqa4icgp522ehttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mq5iwk33mc2rMicrobiome science begins with cold hands and a barcode that has to survive the wind. New on Platypus, @victor.secco@bsky.social follows sampling expeditions on the Belgian coast to trace the invisible labour that turns soil and water into data — and asks who gets the credit.08 Jul 2026 16:08 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mq5iwk33mc2rhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mpo3uhadfs2vCan anthropology's colonial legacies be reassembled on crip time? A new post on Platypus by Seon Shim traces disability anthropology as a practice of taking up space where and how it is not expected — arriving late, moving slowly, and building toward crip futures.02 Jul 2026 13:05 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mpo3uhadfs2vhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mpjy3pnx3k2h🎙️ New Platypod episode! Dr. Ana Carolina de Assis @anthrotechana.bsky.social talks with Dr. Luis Felipe R. Murillo about Common Circuits, his book on minor computing communities and the alternative futures they make possible against AI's enclosure of knowledge. 🎧 https://blog.castac.org/2026/06/platypod-episode-twelve-hacking-alternative-futures/30 Jun 2026 21:46 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mpjy3pnx3k2hhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mphp6pdlvc2sWhy study smell in clothes? A new RAFeCT post on Platypus explores smelling someone else's garments as a way of approaching absence, memory, and intimacy. https://blog.castac.org/2026/06/why-study-smell-in-clothes/30 Jun 2026 00:02 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mphp6pdlvc2shttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mp5f7nvgtc2rToday on Platypus, Şafak Kılıçtepe and Emine Onculer Yayalar explore the governance of bodies in Türkiye's hybrid medical landscape. https://blog.castac.org/2026/06/between-cure-and-care-governing-bodies-in-turkiyes-hybrid-medical-landscape/25 Jun 2026 21:37 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mp5f7nvgtc2rhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mow3jifcls25Today on #Platypus, Vageesh Vishnoi (@vageesh.bsky.social ) asks what ethnographic fieldwork looks like in a platform economy.22 Jun 2026 23:55 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mow3jifcls25https://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3monqb6npek2xToday on #Platypus, Jennifer Foley, Dani Dilkes and Mandy Penney introduce Becoming-With Mushrooms, a Multispecies Collective Autoethnography for Reworlding Educational Environments.19 Jun 2026 16:12 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3monqb6npek2xhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3moiwtewgdk2bToday on #Platypus, Prerna Gupta explores how India's first commercial nuclear plant turned early patriotic pride into generations of local precarity, drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in Maharashtra. Read the full post: https://blog.castac.org/2026/06/a-progress-without-people-six-decades-of-living-next-to-indias-first-nuclear-power-plant/17 Jun 2026 18:26 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3moiwtewgdk2bhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3modkd3p4rc26Today on #Platypus, Nga Shi Yeu reflects on Malaysia's 1999 Nipah virus outbreak through the lens of his childhood and asks how a village sustains itself when its name becomes a global synonym for a zoonosis. Read the full post: https://blog.castac.org/2026/06/viral-afterlives-toponymy-of-zoonotic-ruptures-in-west-malaysia/15 Jun 2026 14:59 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3modkd3p4rc26https://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mo3vuml3mc25Today on #Platypus, Leonardo Thibau presents a multimodal critical cartography of the "Canal do Búfalo" forum, tracing how Brazil's early manosphere used toponymic aliases to frame belonging, resentment, and masculinist truth-making online. Read the full post: https://blog.castac.org/2026/06/cartographing-the-brazilian-manosphere-toponymic-aliases-in-a-public-forum/12 Jun 2026 14:04 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mo3vuml3mc25https://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mnx3bceub22qToday on #Platypus, Aylar Abdolahzadeh traces what ancient campfire debris reveals about human resilience. From striking sparks to keeping a flame alive, fire is a learned skill, and archaeological evidence shows that Neanderthals used it flexibly. Read the post: https://blog.castac.org/2026/06/tracing-the-legacy-of-human-resilience-in-the-debris-of-ancient-campfires/10 Jun 2026 15:57 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mnx3bceub22qhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mnq2mpykcc2jToday on #Platypus, Alejandro Cerón examines how epidemiologists navigate the tension between technical expertise and political objectives towards outbreak mitigation, drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in Guatemala and the enduring myth of John Snow. Read the post: https://blog.castac.org/2026/06/outbreak-mitigation-at-the-crossroads-technical-expertise-political-imperatives-and-the-myth-of-john-snow/07 Jun 2026 20:57 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mnq2mpykcc2jhttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mnhnrt5fds2kToday on #Platypus, Cristian Gustavo Gutiérrez asks: are emerging biotechnologies transforming disability into something to be prevented, corrected, or eliminated?04 Jun 2026 12:46 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mnhnrt5fds2khttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mndhajm3lc2sToday on #Platypus, Ana Paula Perrota, @leodupin.bsky.social and Rosângela Cintrão explore how industrial sanitary norms render traditional food cultures illegal in Brazil, and what that reveals about whose knowledge counts in global food safety regimes Read the post: https://blog.castac.org/2026/06/food-insecurity-under-the-microscope/02 Jun 2026 20:38 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mndhajm3lc2shttps://bsky.app/profile/castac.bsky.social/post/3mnajk6ryjc2cToday on #Platypus, Debjani Chakraborty explores how mobile phone affordances are reappropriated across rural Indian contexts, sometimes as tools of navigation and aspiration, and at other times as mechanisms of surveillance and moral scrutiny. Read the full post: https://blog.castac.org/2026/05/domesticating-affordances-from-surveillance-to-navigation-of-interfaces-how-affordances-are-reappropriated-across-contexts-by-rural-indian-women/01 Jun 2026 16:42 +0000at://did:plc:vjhq4kwygdo3ky65o723dni2/app.bsky.feed.post/3mnajk6ryjc2c