Disqualified

Abstract

This book is about how science is stigmatized and how science is used to stigmatize. It develops the concept of disqualification—the stigmatization of facts, science, and knowledge. The book combines sociological and social psychological ideas about stigma with science studies perspectives on science, technology, and society. Part I of the book focuses on psychiatry and draws on document analysis, in-depth interviews with researchers, and ethnographic analysis of a neuroscientific laboratory. This first part argues that elites use disqualification to steer their fields, forming scientific bandwagons by marking some work as respectable and other work as stigmatized. Second, it demonstrates how disqualification is used to separate scientists from their facts, as disqualified ideas are remade and appropriated. Third, it explains how disqualification impacts professional jurisdiction, as respectable ideas leave stigmatized fields, and stigmatized scientists are relegated to dealing with low-status and denigrated topics. Part II focuses on disqualification as a concept, demonstrating its broad applicability outside of the case of psychiatry. This part argues that disqualification is a unique form of stigma, that it can spread through social networks, and that it is tied to social inequalities, including race, class, and gender. Part II further demonstrates that disqualification is weaponized during group conflicts, stigmatizing groups and separating them from science. It further argues that individual identities and group membership are tied to what is and is not disqualified. As a whole, the book demonstrates how knowledge production and consumption is shaped and controlled by stigma.