A Cultural Discourse Called Science

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterAcademicpeer-review

    Abstract

    In this chapter, science is presented as a cultural discourse, whereby the focus is on science in a European historical context. Thus, “science” evolved in the communities of intellectuals, mainly in ancient Athens. When such communities became more institutionalised and formalised-starting with Plato’s Academy-they became “discourse systems”. After Plato, European intellectual culture is reproduced and transformed, typically in response to key events in European history. Until the 17th century, scientific responses to events assumed the form of a quest for a renaissance. The scientific response to the West European reformation wars and their aftermath (post-war reconstruction) establishes a radical break with this renaissance pattern, igniting an altogether new definition of science. In the past two and a half centuries, enlightenment science has become predominant, yet this post-classical reconstruction of science is not without contestation. By reconstructing science as a cultural discourse, it becomes possible to uncover hegemonic intellectual imperialism, expressed in ethnocentrism and Eurocentrism, and marginalisation of other communities of intellectuals, with a view to making intellectual culture flourish and shape a political sphere according to reason or intellectual insight rather than domination.

    Original languageEnglish
    Title of host publicationThe Routledge Handbook of Cultural Discourse Studies
    PublisherTaylor & Francis
    Pages188-199
    Number of pages12
    ISBN (Electronic)9781003849117
    ISBN (Print)9781032075013
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2024

    Keywords

    • NLA
    • Science and colonialism
    • science questions
    • knowledge
    • Knowledge growth
    • Academic context
    • academic values
    • Discourse
    • Discourse Analysis
    • science technology and society

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