The STS Graduate Program at UBC draws on a rich set of resources at UBC, in Vancouver, and at our sister universities, Simon Fraser University and the University of Washington.
STS Colloquium Schedule (2025/26)
STS Colloquia will be held in Buchanan Tower 1112, 5:00-6:30 PM unless otherwise indicated
TERM 2 (January – April 2026)
January 22: Melinda Bonnie Fagan, University of Utah, Philosophy
“Explanatory Particularism in Scientific Practice”
Abstract: I introduce a new approach to studying explanation across the sciences, which I term “explanatory particularism” (EP). EP differs from other philosophical accounts of explanation in taking social aspects of science as primary. Alongside recent defenses of pluralism about explanation, EP rejects the traditional idea that there is one kind of explanation common to all sciences (and everyday life). Instead, multiple styles of explanation flourish in local contexts, intersecting with one another in diverse ways. More radical than other forms of explanatory pluralism, my particularist approach directs philosophers’ attention to often overlooked aspects of scientific practice: interdisciplinary collaboration and conflict, interlinked aspects of understanding, and a pro-social image of science as diverse yet unified. After introducing the particularist approach, I’ll discuss some of its main implications and applications.
Melinda Bonnie Fagan is Sterling M. McMurrin Professor of Philosophy at the University of Utah. Her background is in biology (Ph.D. 1998, Stanford University) and history and philosophy of science (Ph.D. 2007, Indiana University). In her research she focuses on experimental practices in biology (particularly stem cell and developmental biology), explanation and understanding, and interdisciplinary connections across the sciences. She is the author of more than fifty journal articles, book chapters, and commentaries on various topics in philosophy of science and biology, as well as three monographs. Her most recent book is Explanatory Particularism in Scientific Practice (Oxford, 2025).
Straker Memorial Lecture
February 5, 2026 (5:00 to 6:30 PM)
Location: Green College Coach House
To be followed by a reception
Joe Dumit, Professor of Science & Technology Studies, and Anthropology, Chair of Performance Studies at University of California Davis; Professor in Interdisciplinary Data Collaborations at Aarhus University
https://anthropology.ucdavis.edu/people/joe-dumit
AI & Co-Researching: Hallucinations are a Feature of LLMs – Let’s Use Them
See the Straker Memorial Lecture page for the details
March 19: Lightning talks by STS Graduate Students
Jessica Casey, Science and Technology Studies MA
Inventing Arctic Hysteria: Race Science and the Development of a Scientific Fact
Abstract: “Arctic hysteria” emerged from the diaries of settler explorers as a term for an imagined Indigenous-specific form of madness. Throughout the 20th century, scientists transformed a collection of tenuous settler observations into a pathology tied to Indigenous culture and “race,” which achieved DSM classification in 1994. This talk will frame the disorder’s success as an illustration of race science’s destructive impacts on epistemic rigor in medical research.
Sarah Kamal, Science and Technology Studies MA
Colonial Bureaucracy in Student-Admin Interactions After the Palestine Solidarity Encampments of Summer 2024
Abstract: University administrators responded to campus Palestine solidarity protests with overt repression like suspensions, expulsions, police brutality, and surveillance. But they also used less obvious methods of control. This study examines colonial bureaucracy as a technology of the routine, arbitrary, and mundane for dampening and abating student pressure during and after the global pro-Palestine student encampment movement.
Michael Kishchuk, History MA / STS Research Stream
Making the Line Real: Tracing the Yukon-Alaska Border through the 19th Century
Abstract: A discussion of maps, scientific expeditions, and borders, focused on the Yukon-Alaska border and the ways that surveying and geological mapping were used to establish this political boundary.
Fiona Li: History MA / STS Research Stream
Beyond the Split: The Enduring Legacy of Sino-Soviet Collaborations at Yiqi (China’s First Automobile Works)
Abstract: This thesis explores how collaboration between Chinese and Soviet workers at China’s First Automobile Work (Yiqi) in the 1950s forged lasting personal and technical bonds that outlived the Sino-Soviet split. It shows how these human connections quietly influenced China’s industrial growth and global engagement long after official relations had soured.
Ben Mulchinock: Philosophy MA / STS Research Stream
The Peopling of the Americas and Indigenous-Western Knowledge Integration
Abstract: Ben examines the relationship between Indigenous and scientific methods used in contemporary paleo-migration research. Taking the hotly debated question of the first peopling of the Americas as my case study, I argue for a tempered optimism towards the prospect of relating the two methods. For successful knowledge integration between Indigenous methods (ex. oral history) and scientific methods (ex. radiocarbon dating) to occur, researchers must attend to the ways that these two knowledge communities’ underlying epistemic, ontological, and ethical systems converge and diverge.
April 2: Nancy Tuana, Dupont/Class of 1949 Professor of Philosophy and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Founding Director of the Rock Ethics Institute, Pennsylvania State University
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Tuana
Topic TBA, related to Tuana’s recent book, Racial Climates, Ecological Indifference: An Ecointersectional Approach. Oxford University Press, 2023. OUP
TERM 1 (September – December, 2025)
September 18: Heidi Tworek, UBC History and School of Public Policy and Global Affairs
Dr. Heidi Tworek is Canada Research Chair and Professor of History and Public Policy at UBC, where she directs the Centre for the Study of Democratic Institutions.
https://history.ubc.ca/profile/heidi-tworek/ | https://sppga.ubc.ca/profile/heidi-tworek/
“Online Harassment of Health Communicators: Causes and Consequences”
Abstract: This talk will examine online harassment of health communicators during the Covid-19 pandemic. Based on interviews, surveys, focus groups, and social media data, I explain the phenomenon and explore how online abuse affected health communicators’ personal and professional lives. Finally, I consider the broader consequences for communicating about science and public trust in scientists and healthcare professionals.
September 18: STS Welcome Back Event
To follow Heidi Tworek’s colloquium
7:00 PM at Koerner’s Pub
October 16: Aryan Karimi, UBC Sociology
https://sociology.ubc.ca/profile/aryan-karimi/
“Why Can’t We Test Our Sociological Theories? The Case of Assimilation Theory”
A discussion of current work developing a methodological critique of central theories of sociology, focused on the sociology of migration.
November 20: Alessandro Mongili, Sociology and STS, University of Padua
UBC visitor: https://ces.ubc.ca/profile/alessandro-mongili/
“Management and Maintenance of Digital Platform Interfaces in a Minoritized Language. The Case of Sardinian”
Abstract: Digital platforms and information infrastructures increasingly mediate linguistic presence and recognition yet, for languages such as Sardinian, the process of localization is neither systematic nor institutionally supported. Instead, it relies largely on the initiative of active minorities, grassroots activists, and computer scientists who engage in “localization from below.” Through their efforts, platform interfaces are translated, adapted, and maintained in ways that reflect both the opportunities and the fragilities of digital infrastructures. By examining these dynamics, the presentation highlights how digital infrastructures both reproduce and reshape conditions of linguistic marginalization, while also creating new spaces for activism and experimentation.
Professor Mongili’s research interests include design and development in computing, innovation in peripheral regions, and standardization of endangered languages. He was a founder and first president of the Italian Society of Science and Technology Studies (STS ITalia).
