Abstract
Information technologies, such as the computer-aided dispatch (CAD) system, have fundamentally changed workplace protocols. This paper examines the impacts that the standardized processes associated with the CAD system have on the labour of 9-1-1/police call-takers. Through an analysis of the labour of 9-1-1/police call-takers and their processes for classifying emergency call(er)s, we are able to uncover the negotiated labour between human and machine. It is argued throughout the paper that the standardized processes of the CAD system do not remove the social from call-taking but instead emphasize the use of the social as a resource for classifying call(er)s. The present analysis illustrates how emergency classification is not a standardized process but instead an actively constructed virtual image performed in real space and time by call-takers. It is the call-takers' tacit knowledge and ability to work across the virtual, abstract and material worlds that makes them essential players in emergency response.
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