Whose Knowledge is Valued?: Epistemic Injustice in CSCW Applications

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Ajmani, Leah Hope, Foriest, Jasmine C, Taylor, Jordan, Pittman, Kyle, Gilbert, Sarah, Devito, Michael Ann
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2024
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author Ajmani, Leah Hope
Foriest, Jasmine C
Taylor, Jordan
Pittman, Kyle
Gilbert, Sarah
Devito, Michael Ann
author_facet Ajmani, Leah Hope
Foriest, Jasmine C
Taylor, Jordan
Pittman, Kyle
Gilbert, Sarah
Devito, Michael Ann
contents Social computing scholars have long known that people do not interact with knowledge in straightforward ways, especially in digital environments. While policies around knowledge are essential for targeting misinformation, they are value-laden; in choosing how to present information, we undermine non-traditional -- often non-Western -- ways of knowing. Epistemic injustice is the systemic exclusion of certain people and methods from the knowledge canon. Epistemic injustice chips away at one's testimony and vocabulary until they are stripped of their due right to know and understand. In this paper, we articulate how epistemic injustice in sociotechnical applications leads to material harm. Inspired by a hybrid collaborative autoethnography of 14 CSCW practitioners, we present three cases of epistemic injustice in sociotechnical applications: online transgender healthcare, identity sensemaking on r/bisexual, and Indigenous ways of knowing on r/AskHistorians. We further explore signature tensions across our autoethnographic materials and relate them to previous CSCW research areas and personal non-technological experiences. We argue that epistemic injustice can serve as a unifying and intersectional lens for CSCW research by surfacing dimensions of epistemic community and power. Finally, we present a call to action of three changes the CSCW community should make to move toward its own goals of research justice. We call for CSCW researchers to center individual experiences, bolster communities, and remediate issues of epistemic power as a means towards epistemic justice. In sum, we recount, synthesize, and propose solutions for the various forms of epistemic injustice that CSCW sites of study -- including CSCW itself -- propagate.
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id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2407_03477
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Whose Knowledge is Valued?: Epistemic Injustice in CSCW Applications
Ajmani, Leah Hope
Foriest, Jasmine C
Taylor, Jordan
Pittman, Kyle
Gilbert, Sarah
Devito, Michael Ann
Human-Computer Interaction
Social computing scholars have long known that people do not interact with knowledge in straightforward ways, especially in digital environments. While policies around knowledge are essential for targeting misinformation, they are value-laden; in choosing how to present information, we undermine non-traditional -- often non-Western -- ways of knowing. Epistemic injustice is the systemic exclusion of certain people and methods from the knowledge canon. Epistemic injustice chips away at one's testimony and vocabulary until they are stripped of their due right to know and understand. In this paper, we articulate how epistemic injustice in sociotechnical applications leads to material harm. Inspired by a hybrid collaborative autoethnography of 14 CSCW practitioners, we present three cases of epistemic injustice in sociotechnical applications: online transgender healthcare, identity sensemaking on r/bisexual, and Indigenous ways of knowing on r/AskHistorians. We further explore signature tensions across our autoethnographic materials and relate them to previous CSCW research areas and personal non-technological experiences. We argue that epistemic injustice can serve as a unifying and intersectional lens for CSCW research by surfacing dimensions of epistemic community and power. Finally, we present a call to action of three changes the CSCW community should make to move toward its own goals of research justice. We call for CSCW researchers to center individual experiences, bolster communities, and remediate issues of epistemic power as a means towards epistemic justice. In sum, we recount, synthesize, and propose solutions for the various forms of epistemic injustice that CSCW sites of study -- including CSCW itself -- propagate.
title Whose Knowledge is Valued?: Epistemic Injustice in CSCW Applications
topic Human-Computer Interaction
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2407.03477