Databite No. 43: Sara M. Watson

Sara M. Watson on embodied metaphors for talking about data: How we think about data — and more importantly what we do with it — will depend on the value systems that our conceptual metaphors capture and reify. Much of the rhetoric surrounding data draws on metaphors that privilege an industrial perspective: “data is the new oil,” “we’re mining the data for insights.” Studying the early adopters of self-tracking technology, Sara M. Watson has identified a set of emerging data metaphors starting from a personal, rather than industrial perspective. In this Databite, Watson will explore how we might reframe metaphors for data in a more personal and embodied context to give us a better way to understand our personal relationships and interests in our personal data and its uses. Databites are Data & Society’s weekly lunch conversations focused on unresolved questions and timely topics of interest to our community. To request an invitation, please email events at data society dot net. Intro and outro music tracks by Podington Bear: The Sound of Picture Production Library (soundofpicture.com).