Concept note for the fourth workshop
The fourth workshop of the Knowledge / Value series was held at the University of California at Davis on April 19–20, 2013. As a collaborative, interdisciplinary and trans-institutional undertaking on the theorization of knowledge and value, science and capital, property and intellectual property, biopolitics and political economy, this workshop focused on intellectual property but also its relation to property, as a legal and political form, more generally.
Its interest lies in the ways in which innovation has become a particularly strong signifier of the intersections between knowledge and value in contemporary technoscience; but also in the constitutive role of intellectual property in mediating and materializing this signification. We wish to locate this in relation to contemporary global developments in various arenas of technoscience; but also in relation to historical developments in property law and in conceptions of authorship and ownership.
Conference Schedule
The public conference consisted of three 210min panel spread over both days. In order to broaden out to wider thematic and conceptual concerns, this conference was structured slightly different from previous ones: instead of commentaries directed towards specific papers, the interlocutors spoke for a few minutes about the themes from the papers in relation to their own work and investments. Saturday afternoon, a closed discussion round was held amongst authors, interlocutors and a few invited others.
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Panel 1: Tangibility and Intangibility, Materiality and Abstraction (9h30–13h00)
- Mario Biagioli: “Kinship, Plagiarism, and the Gendering of Authorship”.
- Hyo-Yoon Kang: “When Intellectual Property Becomes Solid: A Look Into The History And Role Of Patent Classification”.
- Interlocutors: Peter Lee, Christopher Kelty, Sabina Leonelli, Gail Davies.
Abstract Biagioli Summary Kang Lee Leonelli
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Panel 2: Territorialities — Space / Place / Race (14h30–18h00)
- Boatema Boateng: “Quilting Foucault: Archaeological Territories and Intellectual Property Law”.
- Brenna Bhandar: “Title by Registration: Instituting Property & Conjuring Race in the Settler Colony”.
- Interlocutors: Meghan Morris, Amit Prasad, Javier Lezaun, Timothy Choy, John Kelly.
Abstract Boateng Summary Bhandar Morris Sunder
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Panel 3: Global Political Economies of Health (9h30–13h15)
- Melinda Cooper: “Humanitarian Markets: The Gates Foundation and Global Public Health beyond Doha”.
- Kristin Peterson: “On the Monopoly: Speculation, Pharmaceutical Markets, and Intellectual Property Law in Nigeria”.
- Kaushik Sunder Rajan: “Ethical Monopoly: Public Interest and Gift in Global Pharmaceutical Economies”.
- Interlocutors: Madhavi Sunder, Cori Hayden, Amy Kapczynski, Joseph Dumit.
Abstract Cooper
This workshop was co-organized by Brenna Bhandar, Mario Biagioli, Timothy Choy, Joseph Dumit, James Griesemer, Cori Hayden, George Marcus, Kristin Peterson and Kaushik Sunder Rajan. The conference was co-sponsored by the Center for Science and Innovation Studies & Science and Technology Studies Program (UC Davis), Department of Anthropology (University of Chicago), Center for Ethnography (UC Irvine), and the UC Davis School of Law.