What is a genetically modified seed? Implications for Science, Seeds and Cyborgs

Orientação: João Arriscado Nunes, Rita Serra e Raúl Garcia-Barrios

Programa de Doutoramento: Governação, Conhecimento e Inovação

Financiamento: FCT

The present project addresses the ontological question of what/who are genetically modified seeds (GMSeeds) in the aftermath of the conflict over their status, as well as its implications for responsible science. It starts from the paradoxical existence of GM seeds as a spectre of a cyborg and follows the new feminist materialism perspectives of technoscience. The research is based on two laboratory case studies which, as instances of independent research, have a potential for providing a platform for mutual engagement on a contested issue. The purpose of these two case studies is to approach the implications of the ideological and cultural foundations of scientific paradigms and practices that create transgenic seeds, and how their meaning is assigned. The aim is therefore to illustrate the dialectic between the processes of construction and representations of GMseeds, based on context-specific practices, stressing their post-human promise incorporated in the metaphor of the cyborg.