Seminar - February 2021

Philosophy of Agricultural Extension

Associate Professor Catherine Kendig, Department of Philosophy, Michigan State University and Assistant Professor Julia Bursten, Department of Philosophy, University of Kentucky

For the Food Values Research Group's February 2021 seminar, we are pleased to welcome Assoc Prof Catherine Kendig and Asst Prof Julia Bursten.

We introduce a novel form of experimental knowledge that is the result of institutionally structured communication practices between farmers and university- and local community-based agronomists (agricultural extension specialists). This form of knowledge is exemplified in these communities’ uses of the concept of grower standard. Grower standard is a widely used but seldom discussed benchmark concept underpinning protocols used within agricultural experiments. It is not a one-size-fits-all standard but the product of local and active interactions between farmers and agricultural extension specialists. Grower standard is in some ways similar to more familiar epistemic objects discussed in philosophy of experiment, such as controls or background conditions. However, we argue that grower standard is epistemically novel, due to how knowledge arising from it is coproduced by farmers and agricultural extension specialists. Further, in the United States, this knowledge coproduction is institutionally structured by federal legislature dating back to the 19th century. We use our analysis of grower standard to focus a discussion of the positionality of the coproducers as well as the epistemic products of this form of knowledge coproduction, and we explore the role extension work plays in shaping agricultural science more broadly.

When: Wednesday 24th February, 10-11 AM

Where: Online. Please RSVP to foodresearch@adelaide.edu.au

Assoc Prof Catherine Kendig is a researcher in the Department of Philosophy at Michigan State University. Her work focuses on scientific classification, natural kinds, species, philosophy of science in practice, and synthetic biology. Her broader interests include the philosophy of biology, history and philosophy of science, metaphysics, and the ethics of new and emerging technologies.

Asst Prof Julia Bursten is a researcher in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Kentucky. Her primary field of research concerns the philosophy of nanoscience. She is also interested in the role of agricultural science in informing scientific epistemology.