Doing STS in and through Germany

Many thanks to all of you who voted - and to all of you who nominated themselves or others. The election process is officially over and we’re delighted to present the new stsing board to you!

Please give a round of virtual applause to Tanja Bogusz, Matthias Kloft, Laura Kocksch, Stefan Laser, Julie Mewes, Alexander Schniedermann and Estrid Sørensen.

The new board is elected for two years – we wish them good luck with the further development of stsing!

Kind regards, The (soon to be obsolete) Election Committee

Dear members and other interested people,
Here you find the access information for the 2021 General Assembly (via Zoom):
https://ruhr-uni-bochum.zoom.us/j/63962897142?pwd=RFZwQlg1NCtHN3kwVVpJd2RhelEyQT09
Meeting-ID: 639 6289 7142
Passwort: %stsing21
Meeting time: Friday, 10 Sept 2021, 16h00 - 19h30 (room will be opened at 15h45) Best, Simon Hirsbrunner

Dear members,

In brief: stsing needs you! Nominate yourself* to run for the board! Nominate your peers!

In detail: The current stsing board was elected only by a few members at the foundational meeting on the 27th October 2020. Now that the association has grown, the current board is stepping down to allow members to vote in a regular board in autumm 2021. For this purpose, an election committee has been formed, which warmly invites all members for nominations!

The nomination period has started and terminates with the presentation of nominees during the general assembly on the 10th September 2021. The election period will start in the subsequent week. To check the duties of board members, please see about. Also, feel free to contact current board members if you have any questions about the practical work the position entails.

Who can stand for elections?

All registered members are eligible as candidates (registration as a member is still possible - see more here: https://stsing.org). According to the Statutes, the board is constituted of 3 Pre-Doc and 4 Post-Doc members of the association.

How can I nominate myself?

Please consider nominating yourself by sending an email to the election committee: elections[at]stsing.org Please add a short statement (up to 200 words) about your motivation and the information whether you are in the pre- or post- doctoral phase of your career (irrespective of whether you work in academia; professors are considered to be in their post-doctoral phase). During the election period all statements will be made accessible for all members.

Nominate your peers

Please also consider the option to propose other members as possible candidates. For that, nominate a person with an email to elections[at]stsing.org and then we ask them whether they wish to accept the nomination.

If you have any questions regarding the nomination, the election or other aspects of the process, do not hesitate to contact us by email or on the mattermost election channel.)

Best, The election committee

Endre Dányi (Goethe Universität Frankfurt am Main), Ingmar Lippert (Brandenburgische Technische Universität and IT University of Copenhagen) and Ann-Kristin Kühnen (TU Dresden)

-- Ingmar Lippert Election committee stsing e.V. stsing – Doing STS in and through Germany

Schedule of the event

10 September 2021 at 16–19:30h (hybrid event, online and in local hubs)

16 hrs Keynote Lecture: Data Natures at the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin (public)

Prof. Dr. Tahani Nadim
Museum für Naturkunde und Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

16:45 hrs General Assembly/Mitgliederversammlung (intern)

17:30 hrs Break

17:45 hrs General Assembly/Mitgliederversammlung (intern)

18:30 hrs Panel Discussion/Podiumsdiskussion: Beyond the faxmachine? Contact tracing as sociotechnical practice in Public Health (public)

Podium participants:

Dr. Tim Eckmanns
Leitung Fachgebiet 37: Nosokomiale Infektionen, Surveillance von Antibiotikaresistenzen und -verbrauch, Robert Koch-Institut

Christoph Höhn
MScPH, Facharzt für Kinder- und Jugendmedizin – Leitung des Sachgebiets Hygiene und Umweltmedizin, Amt für Gesundheit und Gefahrenabwehr des Main-Kinzig-Kreises

19:30 hrs Social Events in Hubs

Vorläufige Agenda der Mitgliederversammlung / Tentative Agenda of the General Assembly

You can suggest items to the agenda of the General Assembly until August 27th by writing an email to board[at]stsing.org

Vorschläge für Tagesordnungspunkte zur Mitgliedsversammlung können bis 27. August hinzugefügt werden. Bitte schriftlich an board[at]stsing.org

Save the date

stsing was founded on 27 October 2020, so it is time for the first general assembly. Our hope was to have this during the Inaugural Conference, but due to the pandemic the conference had to be postponed.

Instead, we are planning a hybrid (online and in presence) event on 10 September 2021 at 16–19:30h. For it to be a bit more than simply organisational speak, there will also be a keynote speaker and a discussion on a current concern. Details will be communicated very soon.

Please note that not only members can attend the general assembly event. The technical issue group is currently developing voting systems that ensure that only those eligible to voting on association matters and to candidate for the next stsing board can actually do so. And we also base the system on trust (more information on the election process in item 6 below).

Call for Hubs for the General Assembly (help needed)

The general assembly will take place as a distributed event, but instead of each participating individually from their home, groups gather in a number of “regional hubs”, and participate together on zoom from these hubs – which can be a small office gathering, a picnic on the campus grass, a private home, a seminar room or indeed wherever you can meet safely (pandemic conform) and have a decent internet connection. Also, members of the board will run the general assembly via Zoom from different hubs, just as key note address and panel discussions will take place via Zoom.

One of the core reasons for organising hubs is that we hope that the local gatherings after the general assembly will go to a local restaurant or a bar to have a bite and a drink. We’ll find a way to stay connected over the evening as well. Maybe we continue the panel discussion that will end the general assembly. We hope the first stsing general assembly will thereby be a nice experience, which we believe happens when people (also) come together in person.

IMPORTANT

The local hubs can only be organized locally, so please consider organizing a hub in your area. Preferably, you communicate the hub via the mattermost channel “General Assembly Hubs”. Then the chance that other people in your area will see that it takes place and join you. You can also inform the stsing board, which will then announce the board together with other information about the general assembly: board[at]stsing.org

Originally initiated by the Verband der Historiker und Historikerinnen Deutschlands e. V., a statement has been formulated concerning the precarious situation of most colleagues working in research and science in Germany. After a discussion on Mattermost, the stsing board decided to officially support the open letter. Please find more information about the letter here.