Socio-scientific issues via actor network theory

Abstract

The view of science within curricula as coherent, generalizable and unproblematic knowledge has little validity in terms of the current literature in the history and the sociology of science. This paper explores Actor Network Theory (ANT) which changes the epistemological premises upon which we depict the generation of knowledge: ANT sees knowledge as construed, contingent, and contentious. This epistemological turn needs to be brought into the analytical frameworks that underlie practices in science education, and curriculum theory in general. As such, ANT invites analysis away from a rhetoric of conclusions towards a rhetoric of contentions.