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The Problem of Tools

Technology and the Sharing of Knowledge

Jessica Thurk

Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

Gary Alan Fine

Swedish Collegium for Advanced Study in the Social Sciences, Uppsala, Sweden and Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

Based on ethnographic research at the National Weather Service and at a large firm of architects in Chicago, we explore the role of technology in mediating knowledge. We consider meteorological databases and computer-aided design systems as tools that standardize and provide access to knowledge, making information transferable across organizational contexts. However, knowledge is always situated and grounded in practice. These tools, even as they standardize, create possibilities for generating and codifying knowledge that is locally meaningful, potentially giving rise to communication problems. Technology is appropriated as part of the local culture, even as it transforms that culture, altering the meaning of knowledge and the nature of creativity at work.

Key Words: ethnography • knowledge • science • technology • work

Acta Sociologica, Vol. 46, No. 2, 107-117 (2003)
DOI: 10.1177/0001699303046002002
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