Exploring Epistemic Boundaries Between Scientific and Popular Cultures

Abstract

Science studies have long been concerned with the complex interrelationship between scientific research and popular culture’s interpretations and reconstructions of scientific findings (Kember 2003; Lancaster 2003; Penley 1997, among others). Disparities between the two are often presented as popular culture’s misinterpretation or misrepresentation of scientific facts; however, in this essay I argue that a more theoretically lucrative approach understands these conflicts as complex social and cultural negotiations over epistemological boundaries between scientific and popular cultures. Understanding such differences is tremendously important in mediated societies where scientific research is mostly understood through its representation in the popular culture. In this paper, I examine what is at stake in popular representations of scientific research and how the popular culture is often seen as threatening to the epistemic boundaries of scientific culture. Using the recent controversy over The Oprah Winfrey Show’ s presentation of controversial medical practices as a case study, this essay examines how distinctions between scientific and popular ways of knowing are constructed, represented and managed. I argue that scientific knowledge should be viewed as a complex and often conflicted cultural discursive practice that signifies boundary negotiations between scientific and popular cultures.