Lay Observers, Telegraph Lines, and Kansas Weather: The Field Network as a Mode of Knowledge Production

Abstract

ArgumentThis paper examines the field network – linking together lay observers in geographically distributed locations with a central figure who aggregated their locally produced observations into more general, regional knowledge – as a historically emergent mode of knowledge production. After discussing the significance of weather knowledge as a vital domain in which field networks have operated, it describes and analyzes how a more robust and systematized weather observing field network became established and maintained on the ground in the early twentieth century. This case study, which examines two Kansas City-based local observer networks supervised by the same U.S. Weather Bureau office, demonstrates some of the key issues involved in maintaining field networks, such as the role of communications infrastructure, especially the telegraph, the procedures designed to make local observation more systematic and uniform, and the centralized, hierarchical power relations that underpinned even a low-status example of knowledge production on the periphery.

Fat talk: A citizen sociolinguistic approach

“…Couvet, Jiguet, Julliard, Levrel, & Teyssèdre, 2008;Miller-Rushing, Primack, & Bonney, 2012;Silvertown 2009). The data produced by citizen scientists are considered both a reliable and systematic means to track change in natural environments, particularly within narrowly defined parameters or foci, such as the presence/absence of birds (Butler, 2003) or specific weather patterns (Vetter, 2011). Purdam's (2014) work on street-begging is one of a few examples of citizen science expanded into the social sciences.…”

The history of public participation in ecological research

“…Programs that follow a contributory or collaborative participatory model (Table 1) – such as the North American Breeding Bird Survey, the US National Weather Service's Cooperative Observer Program (NWS‐COOP), North American Bird Phenology Program, and lilac monitoring programs (the latter two now a part of the USA National Phenology Network, USA‐NPN, http://www.usanpn.org) – have yielded national‐ or continental‐scale datasets of biological and physical data that could not have been collected otherwise. The US NWS, for example, was tasked with gathering weather data that were critical to a variety of aspects of the economy, particularly agriculture, but was provided with only a limited budget to do so (Vetter 2011b). They therefore followed the example of weather bureaus in Europe by turning to volunteers who were broadly distributed throughout the country.…”

“…Advances in communications, transportation, and computing have made it easier for volunteers to contribute and for scientists and volunteers to manage and analyze the resulting data. For example, the development of railroads and the telegraph were integral to the development of the NWS‐COOP (and other, similar observer networks) and the near‐term weather forecasts it supported (Vetter 2011b). More recent advances in data management, online resources (eg http://www.citizenscience.org), and communications technology, as well as studies of the quality and value of citizen‐science data, have continued to transform the field (Dickinson et al .…”

Citizen Science and Citizens’ Observatories: Trends, Roles, Challenges and Development Needs for Science and Environmental Governance

“…(Vetter, 2011). This example shows that the collection of data over many decades has led to the compilation of long-term data series, which are extremely valuable for the work of modern science (Miller-Rushing et al, 2012).…”