Labs of Our Own

Feminist Tinkerings with Science

By Sig / Sara Giordano

Rutgers University Press

From climate change to COVID-19 to reproductive justice, there has been deep political polarization around science. Labs of Our Own provides a unique entry point into these 21st century science wars by focusing on our affective relationships to science. The book delves into various sites where scientists, teachers, artists, and activists claim to create more democratic access to science – from DIY biology community labs to feminist classrooms to activist science pratitioners. The reader will find that these claims for and attempts at democratic sciences not only impact what counts as science and who counts as a scientist but reconfigures who is included in the proper public. Instead of arguing for a knee-jerk defense of Science against right wing attacks, Labs of Our Own builds the case for a feminist, anti-racist, decolonial, queer science tinkering practice that intentionally, politically, and ethically acts to produce new challenges to the definition and boundaries of the human.

With clarity and care, Giordano investigates how race, gender, sexuality and capitalism position us in relationship to capitalist science while showing the multiplicity of sciences flourishing outside it in DIY lab spaces. Dwelling with 'tinkerers,' practitioners of science outside of capitalism’s well-funded labs, this book imagines the possibilities of a better, more just science in solidarity with Black, decolonial, and other feminisms. Kalindi Vora, author of Reimagining Reproduction: Surrogacy, Labor, and Technologies of Human Reproduction

As students and academic workers speak out about university complicities in empire and accumulation, Sig Giordano's Labs of Our Own offers a heartfelt and street smart pathway to the scientific works we need and the scientific cultures we need to leave behind. An essential read for teachers, scientists, tech workers, and anyone else who cares about how we make knowledge about our worlds. Lilly Irani, author of Chasing Innovation: Making Entrepreneurial Citizens in Modern India

Sig/Sara Giordano is an associate professor of interdisciplinary studies at Kennesaw State University in Georgia.

Prelude: You’re Either with Us or Against Us: Affective Dissonance and 9/11
Introduction
Interlude 1: Serendipity
Chapter 1: (De)constructing DIY Community Biology Labs
Interlude 2: If We Knew What We Were Doing
Chapter 2: The Tinkerer as a New Scientific Subject
Interlude 3: Learning the Limits of Ethical Debate
Chapter 3: Becoming the Informed Public
Interlude 4: Nerd Masculinity
Chapter 4: Feminist Labs of Our Own in Academia?
Interlude 5: When the Right Comes to the Defense of Science
Chapter 5: Towards Queer Sciences of Failure
Interlude 6: Queer Revolt
Chapter 6: Tinkering as a Feminist Praxis
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Notes
References
Index