[Themaintainers] Maintainers at BHC, and a reading suggestion

[Philip Scranton]

I'm connected to the PACHS, now CHTSM operation, which has a history of technology group, chaired by Heidi Voskuhl at Penn and Martin Collins at NASM-Smithsonian. I expect they would welcome helping organize & facilitate a reading group.  Orr's book is a classic indeed and a foundation stone for the communities of practice literature, which might be a destination for future discussions.  Martin's email is, I think, collinsm at si.edu  Best to all, Phil Scranton

Sent from my iPad

On Sep 11, 2016, at 4:02 PM, "Cowan, Ruth S" <rcowan at sas.upenn.edu> wrote:

> I'm also interested in a reading group.
> 
> IS ANYONE amongst us connected to an institution that has facilities for online video meetings, the kind that CHSTM (which used to be PACHS) runs?
> 
> Ruth 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: themaintainers-bounces at lists.stevens.edu [mailto:themaintainers-bounces at lists.stevens.edu] On Behalf Of Matthew Weinstein
> Sent: Sunday, September 11, 2016 3:24 PM
> To: themaintainers at lists.stevens.edu
> Subject: Re: [Themaintainers] Maintainers at BHC, and a reading suggestion
> 
> I'd love to read orr's book, too.
> 
> On Sep 11, 2016, at 12:18 PM, Lara Houston wrote:
> 
>> Hi Nathan / All
>> 
>> I'd be really interested in a reading group. Orr's book is deservedly a classic.
>> 
>> Best wishes
>> 
>> Lara
>> 
>> 
>>> On 11 Sep 2016, at 20:00, Ensmenger, Nathan <nensmeng at indiana.edu> wrote:
>>> 
>>> I will add my voice to the chorus of folks interested in a Maintainers panel at the BHC.  By my count Bernardo, Ellan, and Andrew have all expressed interest, and we can take the conversation off-list.   If anyone else would like to chime in, just send me an email.
>>> 
>>> On a completely different point: early on in the history of this mailing list it was suggested that we do a virtual reading group.  I have been thinking recently about how communities of maintainers communicate tacit knowledge, and was reminded of what I would argue is one of the greatest history of technology accounts of maintenance work ever written, namely\
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Orr, Julian. Talking About Machines: an Ethnography of a Modern Job, ILR Press Ithaca, NY, 1996.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> If you have not read this book, which is about Xerox repair technicians, you should so as soon as possible!   If you are too busy to read the whole book, read chapter 8  ("war stories of the service triangle"), which describes the ways in which these technicians use stories (vignettes, as Orr describes them) to teach each other the complicated knowledge required to diagnose and repair complex machinery.  These stories were typically shared over breakfast at informal gatherings.  When the company tried to formalize this tacit knowledge into a database driven expert system, the whole system broke down (as did the machines...)
>>> 
>>> Andy and Lee (and others) have done a fabulous job getting the word out about *why* we should study maintenance. Orr's book is an excellent example of *how* to do it.  If we do decide to do a #maintainers reading group, it might be a good place to start.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> -Nathan 
>>> 
>>> --- 
>>> Nathan Ensmenger 
>>> Associate Professor of Informatics 
>>> School of Informatics and Computing 
>>> Indiana University, Bloomington 
>>> homes.soic.indiana.edu/nensmeng/ 
>>> 
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