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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
- Sprache: Englisch
The notion of the dispositif (dispositive) is particularly relevant for understanding phenomena where one can observe the reproducibility of distributed technical activities, operational or discursive, between human and non-human actors. This book reviews the concept of the dispositive through various disciplinary perspectives, analyzing in turn its technical, organizational and discursive dimensions. The relations of power and visibility enrich these discussions. Regarding information and communication sciences, three main uses of this concept are presented, on the one hand to illustrate the heuristic scope of issues integrating the dispositive and, on the other hand, to demonstrate its unifying aspect in this disciplinary field. The first use concerns the complexity of media content production; the second relates to activity traces using the concept of the "secondary information dispositive"; finally, the third involves the use of the dispositive in contexts of digital participation.
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Table of Contents
Cover
Acknowledgments
Preface
Introduction
PART 1: Epistemological Foundations
Introduction to Part 1
1 Techne-Poiesis and the Dispositive
1.1. Timelines, reproducibility and technical action
1.2. Machines and dispositives: the place of humans
1.3. Technical rationalization and technology
1.4. Conclusion
2 The Dispositive, Organization and Collective Action
2.1. Organizational form and role representation
2.2. Organizational arrangements and collective actions
2.3. Dispositive: a space of partnership configuration
2.4. Conclusion
3 Discursive Productions and the Dispositive
3.1. Discursive resources and the dispositive
3.2. Role of the dispositive in cultural transmission
3.3. The socially unthought-of
3.4. Conclusion
PART 2: The Dispositive and ICS
Introduction to Part 2
4 Complexity of Media Productions
4.1. Television: an embedding of dispositives
4.2. A complex text media
4.3. The complex informational dispositive
4.4. Conclusion
5 Data, Activity Traces and the Dispositive
5.1. Secondary information dispositive
5.2. Information visibility
5.3. A cybernetic vision of the dispositive
5.4. Conclusion
6 Digital Participation and Work
6.1. Participation on a specific platform
6.2. Collective work actions, dispositive and digital technology
6.3. Actions, representations and effects of the dispositive
6.4. Conclusion
Conclusion
References
Index of Authors
Index of Common Terms
End User License Agreement
Guide
Cover
Table of Contents
Begin Reading
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Concepts to Conceive 21st Century Society Set
coordinated by Valérie Larroche and Olivier Dupont
Volume 3
The Dispositif
A Concept for Information and Communication Sciences
Valérie Larroche
First published 2019 in Great Britain and the United States by ISTE Ltd and John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms and licenses issued by the CLA. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside these terms should be sent to the publishers at the undermentioned address:
ISTE Ltd
27-37 St George’s Road
London SW19 4EU
UK
www.iste.co.uk
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
111 River Street
Hoboken, NJ 07030
USA
www.wiley.com
© ISTE Ltd 2019
The rights of Valérie Larroche to be identified as the author of this work have been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018966655
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-1-78630-309-7
Acknowledgments
First, I would like to thank Jacqueline Deschamps, Olivier Dupont and Jean-Paul Metzger, the three teacher–researchers involved in this project, and the “Concepts to Conceive 21st Century Society” set for their commitment, perseverance and their abundant reflection, which made the preparation of this book possible. Even if I assume full responsibility for the content of this book, I consider them as co-authors given their involvement.
I would also like to thank the proofreaders of this paper, Julia Bonaccorsi, Josiane Boutet, Stéphane Chaudiron, Thierry Lafouge, Marie-Armelle Larroche, Marie-France Peyrelong and Isabelle Vidalenc for their careful reading, encouragement and constructive suggestions.
The students and teacher–researchers who have been taking part in the teaching of the epistemology of information and communication sciences at the Lyon III IUT (University Institute of Technology) over the past decade have made possible fruitful exchanges, which are reflected in this book. Thanks to all of you, especially Martine Vila.
Finally, I would like to thank all those who encouraged me in this project and believed in its successful completion, in particular Jacqueline Bérard, Patrick Boutet, Marcel Galea, my children Laura and Antoine, and my family.
I am very grateful to all these contributors, without whom this book would not have been possible.
Preface
This book is part of the set: “Concepts to Conceive 21st Century Society”. This set is a state of the art collection of the latest theoretical developments started by researchers in Information and Communication Sciences (ICS) embracing their discipline. The authors of the set have put forward an interplay of concepts employed in the ICS community. These concepts are also used in other disciplines related to the humanities and social sciences (history, sociology, economics, linguistics, psychology, etc.) besides often fitting in line with the concerns of science and technology researchers (ergonomics, artificial intelligence, data analysis, etc.).
In this set, we aim to highlight the theoretical approaches used in ICS, which is often regarded as a cross-disciplinary field, from a deliberately conceptual point of view. We thought that this was the right choice to supplement the different epistemological works that have already been carried out in the field.
To describe in further detail the perspective adopted in each of these works, we should point out that it represents the point of view of researchers in ICS with a didactic aim and an epistemological focus. We will start by considering ICS as an academic discipline that contributes to the creation and dissemination of knowledge related to information and communication.
Thus, our theoretical reflection will be based on the analysis of a series of concepts widely used by the ICS community, and we will aim to make it accessible to humanities and social sciences students as well as useful for teachers and researchers in several fields and for professionals who wish to consider their practices. This interplay of concepts allows us to conceive 21st Century society in its social and technological aspects. It also helps shed light on human and technological relations and interactions.
So far, this series is expected to include a dozen works, each of which presents one of the following concepts, which are widely used in ICS: power, discourse, mediation, the dispositif, memory and transmission, belief, knowledge, exchange, public/private, representation, writing and aesthetics.
Each book in this set shares the same structure. A first part, called “Epistemological foundations”, summarizes and allows us to compare the theories which over time have developed and then re-examined the concept in question. A second part presents recent problematics in ICS, which involve the concept with the aim of establishing or analyzing the topic researched. This organization of the content can get rid of the restrictive meanings that concepts may take on in the public or professional sphere, or even in various disciplines.
The first four books examine in turn the concepts of power, discourse, mediation and dispositive (dispositif). In these first texts we come across two concepts with a strong historical background : power and discourse; and the two others have emerged instead in the contemporary period: mediation and the dispositive.
These books are the fruit of collective reflection. Regular meetings among the different authors have made collaborative development of these four texts possible. The content of these works and of the preparatory work on the other concepts also forms the basis that has been offered in several types of education for the past 10 years or so. Thus, it has been tested before an audience of students at different levels.
Some authors have already been asked to write about the other concepts. The series coordinators will see that these authors follow the logic of the set and the structure of the first books.
Introduction
To deal with the concept of the dispositif (dispositive)1 and respect the logic of the Concepts to Conceive the 21st Century set, our discussion is based on two clearly distinguishable parts. Part 1 covers the epistemological foundations of the dispositive. It clarifies the concept of dispositive by means of authors of any disciplines who have provided a definition or discussions related to one of the technical, organizational or cultural aspects specific to their field of research. This part is intended for any person interested in human and social sciences, who wishes to further study what we call the dispositive. Part 2 focuses more on issues concerning information and communication sciences. Our collective position is to consider ICS as, on the one hand, an academic discipline contributing to the transmission of the information and communication culture and, on the other hand, a research discipline.
Even though we note that numerous authors use the term dispositive in its notional form, this book explores its heuristic potential. The approach is to clarify points of view, whether they are those of practitioners or researchers. This is why discussions often vary between operational considerations and theoretical ones, as they influence each other.
The first part provides a comprehensive analysis of the state of the art of the concept, in which the author of the book often gives way to the authors quoted. The second part is more focused on the vision of ICS, here it is more difficult for the author to remain completely neutral. To give just one example, the theme selection inevitably reflects her areas of interest.
We very clearly differentiate in the rest of this introduction our two parts, which are, respectively, entitled “Epistemological foundations” and “The Dispositive and ICS”.
Part 1: Epistemological Foundations
By checking the term dispositif (dispositive) in the Trésor de la langue française (1971–1994)2, made available in computerized version (the TLFi) by the Centre national de ressources textuelles et lexicales (CNRTL, National Center for Textual and Lexical Resources), we find the following etymology:
“The term dispositif is derived from disponere which means to dispose. A notion of organization, arrangement is present in the etymology of the word dispositif. Before 1615, dispositif was defined as the ‘part of an enactment which absolutely rules’”3 (Pasquier, 1963–1967, orig. ed. 1560, p. 847).
The first understanding of the word dispositif is then legal, and refers to a text that specifies implementing terms of the written provisions included in this text. In other words, the enactment contains practical provisions. In 1797, a second definition emerged, written by Jean-François de Galaup, Earl of La Pérouse (1741–1788), author of the Voyage de La Pérouse autour du monde. Dispositive is then defined as a “set of elements ordered for a specific purpose” (de Galaup, 1797, p. 90). In a military context, the word means a set of means and measures arranged according to a strategy. To these definitions we can add the more technical and common one: “The way parts of an appliance are arranged for a specific purpose, parts of a machine” (CNRTL, “Dispositif”, A, 1).
When starting this research on the dispositive, we were sure of its link with technique and an organizational form, two aspects found in the previous definitions. Progressively, technical activity4 appeared as intrinsically linked to the dispositive. For example, humans use techniques to perform repetitive actions within the dispositive. However, the discursive aspect present in the legal definition of dispositive was only discovered later, although it is a crucial component of it. For example, the description of a process within a dispositive can be written to collectively share the order of operations, and dialogue can facilitate the exchange of best practice to improve the effectiveness of the dispositive.
In this book, we will see that, depending on the disciplines using the term dispositif, the technique becomes a skill, a know-how, a tool and a practice, which leads to a relationship between humans and technical objects. The organizational aspect introduces roles commissioned to perform collective repetitive activities, but also actual tasks. The dispositive is a framework in which techniques and humans are arranged to make it possible to perform repetitive and distributed activities. The collective aspect requires coordination between human and non-human actors. Dispositives of various natures can overlap, as the result of one dispositive can be integrated into another. The example of a book publication dispositive implies that there is a book produced in another dispositive. This aspect is further developed in Chapter 2. Finally, Chapter 3 studies the place of discourse in the dispositive. The documents circulating within the dispositive illustrate the fact that discourse is a component of the dispositive. However, it is also the purpose of some dispositives to produce discourse. The media illustrates this category. This last chapter also makes it possible to go beyond the operational aspect of dispositives to discuss their social and identity impacts.
The dispositive is understood in this first part both as a concrete and scientific object. Engineering and expertise fall within the first type, and the cultural and social interpretations of dispositives integrated into contexts of use fall within the second one. The dispositive is therefore approached from scientific, operational and cultural perspectives.
Part 2: The Dispositive and ICS5
The second part is deliberately focused on issues covered by ICS, the discipline to which the author belongs. Dispositive is a term that is often found in publications of ICS researchers. The interest in the dispositive is already illustrated by the use of the term in the presentation of research teams6. The Dicen-IDF (Dispositifs d’information et de communication à l’ère numérique (Information and Communication Devices in the Digital Era, Paris, France) laboratory includes in its name the term dispositive.
Other research laboratories use the term to identify or explain their research themes.
It is also the case for the I3M (Mediation, Information, Milieux, Medias, Médiations; Information, Environnements, Média, Médiations) laboratory of the Nice, Sofia Antipolis and Toulon Universities, whose research subjects are “information and communication socio-technical dispositives (DISTIC)”.
The MICA laboratory (Mediation, Information, Communication and Art research laboratory) of the Bordeaux Montaigne University reflects on “Mediation mutations in the digital and globalization era”, from which one of the lines of research Information & Connaissance (Information & Knowledge) focuses on the “uses of digital devices and the new practices they generate”.
The Gripic (Interdisciplinary Research Group on Information and Communication Processes) at Celsa specifies, on the other hand, that the discipline “focuses on information and communication actors, processes, dispositives and phenomena produced in social life”7.
Finally, for others, the field of analysis clearly includes the dispositive object; the focal point of GERiiCO (Groupe d’Etudes et de Recherche Interdisciplinaire er Information et Communication – Group for Studies and Interdisciplinary Research into Information and Communication) in Lille is the analysis of info-communication practices, processes and dispositives studied under their linguistic, discursive, technological and symbolic aspects.
This list illustrates the variety of uses. It is a term which defines a method, frames the object of research or makes it possible to identify issues, all at the same time. It is also often an unquestioned notion that authors consider as self-evident or not crucial.
In this second part, we have selected dispositive mobilizations as a concept (therefore integrated into the formulation of the questioning) or as an object of study8. In the field of information, communication and media, the term dispositive is commonly used to refer to all material substrates of communication. “We talk in that sense about media dispositive, television dispositive, editorial dispositive: in each case, it is to highlight that communication implies an organization, relies on material resources, requires technical know-how, defines frameworks for intervention and expression” (Jeanneret, 2005, p. 50). The elements listed in this quote by Yves Jeanneret contain components of the dispositive discussed in Part 1 and reused in Part 2 according to the ICS theme considered.
The I3M laboratory (Information Environments, Media, Mediations) formulates a questioning in terms of the dispositive, which allows it to “consider world transformations by highlighting the flexible and powerful interactions of technologies with their environment according to structuring and coercive forces, but which never fully make sense and whose purpose can always be diverted through the use made of them by the subjects” (Rasse, Durampart, Pelissier, 2014).
Jean-Mathieu Méon, ICS researcher at the CREM (Centre de Recherche sur les Médiaions – Research Center for Mediations) of the University of Lorraine in Metz, in collaboration with visual art researchers, presents a book on cultural and artistic dispositives. He indicates in the introduction of the collective work that “in terms of art and culture, this approach helps to maintain together an internal perspective on art works and practices (their constituent interests, the intentions and representations they support, the stratagems and methods governing their layout) and an external perspective (the conditions and forms of their setup, their presentation to the public, the way they are individually and collectively seen)” (Méon, 2011, p. 9). The points of interest he lists will be later associated with dispositive questioning.
The notion of dispositive is then “clearly heuristic since it leads us to look closely at how changes happen, in terms of contexts, procedures, materials, orders” (Jeanneret, 2005, p. 50). This is why we have chosen to further develop some ICS dispositive mobilizations.
In this part, we shall focus on the work of ICS researchers related to specific objects, and in which authors use the term dispositive in their own research. The theoretical tools integrating the dispositive make it possible to decipher the complexity of info-communication phenomena. For Violaine Appel and Thomas Heller, who worked on the communication dispositive concept of organizations, “the concept of dispositive implies at the level of scientific practice a position which is both analytical (description of power technologies) and critical (especially revealing power struggles)” (Appel and Heller, 2010, pp. 45–46).
We have chosen to further study three current ICS themes, on the one hand, to illustrate the questioning heuristic scope integrating the dispositive concept and, on the other hand, to demonstrate the unifying aspect of this concept in ICS. Indeed, authors focusing on the media field, information or organization communication discuss the concept.
The first issue tackled in Chapter 4 questions the complexity of the productions of media content by means of the dispositive concept, from the point of view of publishers and journalists, but also from those who manage the information produced in organizations or institutions. Digital technology adds complexity to interactions9 and requires a better overall view to understand media convergence and the necessary adaptation of traditional media.
Chapter 5 reflects on the concept of the secondary information dispositive, which is already well defined in the document context, to assess its heuristic scope in view of the object traces of activities. This chapter makes it possible to show two very different visions of these dispositives, one focused on interfaces and another on a cybernetic vision.
Finally, the last chapter discusses participation from the dispositive perspective, and cross-references the views of researchers linked to media discourse, information management and learning or organization communication. The social web led to a collaboration of platforms with users, whether it is to collectively produce discourse or act and learn.
In this book, each part is independent and can therefore be read on its own. The same goes for the chapters composing them (especially those of Part 2).
1
The concept of “
dispositif
” in French is hard to translate into English. We have chosen, like some authors (Raffnsøe
et al
., 2014; Kessler, 2011) to use the little-used English term “dispositive” to allow us to differentiate various dimensions of the concept.
2
19th- and 20th-Century dictionaries in 16 volumes and one addendum.
3
“Le terme
dispositif
est un dérivé de
disponere
qui signifie disposer. Une notion d’organisation, d’agencement est présente dans l’étymologie du mot
dispositif
. Avant 1615, le
dispositif
se définit comme la ‘partie d’un texte législatif qui statue impérativement’ (E. Pasquier, 1963–1967, éd. orig. 1560, p. 847)” in the French text.
4
We prefer the term activity to the term action, as activity implies a human operation toward a goal. As a dispositive is provided with a purpose
a priori
or
a posteriori
, actions taking place with in it are activities. Nevertheless, the term action, which is more generic than activity, can be found in this book, as some authors prefer it. We will come back to it in this book, especially in
Chapter 2
.
5
Both the “Communication science” and “Information science” disciplines are, in France, gathered in a single academic discipline.
6
The directory of doctoral schools and research units was very useful for this analysis. It is available at:
https://appliweb.dgri.education.fr/annuaire/listeentite.jsp?entite=ur&sd=22&prov=motcle
(accessed December 31, 2017).
7
http://www.celsa.fr/formation-initiale-recherche.php
.
8
Let us recall that the ICS objects of study revolve around human and social practices and productions, while concepts must be combined to explain and understand the objects of study and phenomena that can be identified. Some authors mean by object of research an object of study associated with a conceptual point of view (Monnoyer-Smith, 2013). We will come back to it in the conclusion of
Chapter 3
and in the introduction of
Part 2
.
9
Etymology of the term interaction: a word composed of the Latin prefix
inter
; between, and action, from the Latin
actio
; ability to act, activity, action, act, doing, performance, derived from the verb
agere
; to act, to do. The notion of interaction, associated with the dispositive, implies a mutual influence of the connected persons, objects, tools, etc. In sociology or in psychology, social interaction is the mutual influence of persons or groups of persons in contact within a social system. Interactions are verbal or non-verbal human-to-human relationships (gestures, gazes, attitudes, etc.), which results in an action from the interlocutor in response, which has itself an effect on the relationship initiator. See the introductory essay
Erving Goffman’s sociology
(Nizet and Rigaut, 2014).
PART 1Epistemological Foundations
Introduction to Part 1
As indicated in the general introduction, this first part helps us to understand the concept of the dispositive from its different aspects. Chapter 1 deals with technique, its relationship with humans, science and the notion of efficiency. Chapter 2 highlights the importance of the roles carried out by human actors and of the coordination activities to ensure a collective action within the dispositive. This action can also result from partnership-based configurations. Finally, Chapter 3 is dedicated to the place of discourse in the dispositive. Discourses and teleological documents circulating within operational devices are discussed. This last chapter also makes it possible to present dispositives whose purpose is to produce discourses made available to a public and those who facilitate the realization of collective representations, in particular those of power. Finally, the last dispositives studied move away from realization and have a heuristic aim. They make it possible to produce society models or better understand some social and psychoanalytic mechanisms.
1Techne-Poiesis and the Dispositive
Technical actions take place in a dispositive, which we will detail in this chapter. Among these components are always found technical objects handled or conceptualized by humans. Jean-Pierre Meunier1 (1999) clearly conveys the pervasiveness of technique when one studies the dispositive: “At the center of the network corresponding to the concept of dispositive can surely be found meanings strongly implying technique […]”2 (p. 83). Expressions commonly used in the professional world such as mounting device, scenographic device, manufacturing device, etc., refer to hardware arrangements making possible the production of a product or object. A film is an object, or even an artwork produced by means of different devices, including the mounting device for example3. A car, décor, processed food, etc., are objects produced using a device. The latter is present whenever an object is reproduced in several copies.
Techne, from the Greek τέχνη, for the ancient Greeks referred to “production” or “physical manufacturing” and efficient action4. Techne-poiesis helps us to differentiate physical manufacturing from creative action5. The dispositive is a space implementing this relationship between techne and poiesis. The implementation of technical activities makes it possible to create artworks or perform repetitive operations. Some of these activities relate to art, and others relate to the technical or even industrial field. The proficiency of the cinematograph thus allows the production of a film (an artwork) and the assembly line of a car manufacturer the production of cars (a product).
In this chapter, we will discuss in the first part the timelines characterizing a dispositive, its reproducible and aesthetic aspect allowing us to revisit the definition of techne and its relationship with poiesis. The second part differentiates, on the one hand, technique, tool and instrument, and, on the other hand, dispositive and machine. It also introduces the notions of technical skill and arrangement, a consequence of the repetition of technical activities in a dispositive. In the last part, we compare the term technique with that of technology to discuss the scientific and efficient aspects of dispositives.
1.1. Timelines, reproducibility and technical action
We focus in this chapter on the technical aspect of a dispositive. This is why we have chosen to talk about its characteristics for a researcher–engineer, for whom “the technical issue comes down, in essence, to the dispositive issue”6 (Bachimont, 2004, p. 16)7. Timelines, the reproducibility of technical activities and their efficiency within a dispositive will be successively discussed.
1.1.1. Timelines within dispositives
To begin with, the first characteristic we wish to develop relates to timelines8 linked to a dispositive. The latter is defined as “a practical and spatial organizationable to produce and determine a future”9 (Bachimont, 2004, p. 16). This definition is linked to designers’ vision of the dispositive.
For this definition, the timeline is a defining feature of the dispositive whose function is “to convert a relationship with time into a relationship with space. Technique is, at this level, a de-temporalization of the future in order to spatialize it”10 (Bachimont, 2004, p. 18). To characterize this idea of space allocated to the dispositive, we borrow from Michel de Certeau11 his distinction between location and space. A location has an instantaneous configuration at a given time, where two elements are necessarily in well-defined positions. Space, on the other hand, takes into account the movement unfolding there, and Michel de Certeau (1990) refers to it as the “practiced location” (p. 173). The example of the street perfectly illustrates this distinction. The street becomes space because of walkers, while a street is geometrically defined by urban planners. By extension, it can be said that it is only during a theatrical performance that a theater becomes a space where the public and the actors act. Space, for Michel de Certeau (1990), integrates “the effect produced by the operations directing it, detailing it, temporalizing it, and leading it to function as versatile units of conflicting programs or contractual proximities”12 (p. 173). The street becomes space when the walker, the demonstrator, the seller, etc., occupy it. The dispositive, on the other hand, is defined as space, when users act to benefit from the service or to make it work, thus participating in a collective set where actions follow one another.
In the dispositive, the future becomes a modality of the present or, in other words, “the present makes the future available”13 (Bachimont, 2004, p. 18). A dispositive considers a depth of time, especially linked to the useful time to perform actions or facilitate the sequence of events. It models flows, since successive operations can be considered. The dispositive then reconciles the spatial and time dimensions. It is a space of possible futures. The dispositive is not just a simple arrangement observed at a given time, but an organized space where actions take place. An organization will be considered as a dispositive when it is animated by technical actions performed by machines or humans while respecting a sequence. In other words, actions influence and shape the dispositive. “The dispositive does not have the purity of structures14: its form is only the arrangement determined in space and time within which flows (forces) processed by it are balanced and stabilized”15 (Vouilloux, 2007, p. 157)16. Bernard Vouilloux17 illustrates this idea of flow within the dispositive when it justifies the success of the theatrical model in the criticism of dispositives:
“The theatrical dispositive provides a perfect legibility of two of the features thought to constitute notion, arrangement and technique, all occurring as if technique was the only force setting in motion the form of the arrangement”18 (p. 160).
In this quote, Bernard Vouilloux explains that the dispositive transforms the arrangement in space (here the décor, light, sound, etc.) when the play takes place and, more generally, when the action or event is effective within the dispositive.
The arrangement of the dispositive offers a potential and modalities for actions. We will be able to talk about a genuine dispositive when the latter is animated by the effect of the actions performed by humans and technical objects.
For Brigitte Albero19, who defines dispositives in the training sector, timelines are varied and strained. There are, of course, those of the actors – in her context, trainers and learners – who must deal with the contingencies linked to their activity and who modernize the dispositive. She adds to it “the time axis of the designers’ past experience, which led to the creation of the dispositive, as well as the projections and expectations directing its trajectory”20 (Albero, 2010, p. 49). We can see then that different timelines cross a dispositive according to the actors considered (designer, operative, beneficiary, etc.)21.
Bruno Bachimont (2004) adds to these timelines a notion of planning:
“It is because we know that we have a future, that there is an ‘after’ following the ‘now’ that we are currently living, that we want to plan an after. […] There is a future, this future is open, uncertain, and it is to reduce this uncertainty, to overcome the lack of determination of the future, that technique is involved to build the future in a controlled manner, as it is reproducible”22 (p. 18).
This idea applies well to dispositives creating products or services, dispositives where experiments take place, and those in which a space where events could take place is created (a performance, film viewing, etc.).
1.1.2.The discovery of reproducibility
We identify a second feature of the dispositive, reproducibility:
“The distinctive feature of the dispositive is that it is able to repeat the same sequence of events from given initial conditions. […] It is the permanence of the dispositive as it is registered in space that makes it possible to reproduce the result, just like a computer program whose permanence in the memory makes it possible to perform all the actions necessary when it is run”23 (Bachimont, 2004, p. 18).
The machine is an example of dispositive in which a series of similar objects is produced by means of pre-established operations that can be referred to as handling (Bachimont, 2004, p. 18). It is not difficult to justify and observe the reproducibility of technical activities. In an artistic context, it is more difficult. The dispositive comes alive when actions are effective. At the moment of the update, action is more important than the arrangement of the elements, which are forgotten when everything works well (the light effects and the scenery are forgotten to experience the play).
When an artwork is designed, we focus more on the artist. The technical conditions of its design are considered secondary:
“We shall call ‘apparatus’, and more specifically ‘projective apparatus’, these technical dispositives of modernity, such as perspective, camera obscura, museum, photography, cinema, psychoanalysis therapy, etc., which initially represent the conditions of arts, time after time”24 (Déotte, 2008)25.
Thus, apparatus is not the object of study, but the resource that is essential for the appearance or creation of an event. Most often, this term is used when the focus is on what is going to make creation possible. Artists create artworks in apparatus, because it is their production which focuses the attention, overlooking the technical environment framing their creation. Apparatus is also what “gives its pageantry to the appearance”26 (Déotte, 2004, p. 101), as this expression emphasizes the purely creative orientation of the apparatus. The dispositive calls for another position. In the same environment, the use of the term dispositive raises questions on the place of the technique and knowledge implemented by tradesmen in dispositives making it possible to create the environment necessary and favorable for creation. Let us consider the example of a ballet. The staging, scenery and costumes are many dispositives whose results facilitate the performance of dancers. Having a point of view on dispositives then implies taking an interest in the staging techniques, the way roles are played among the directing team, which requires focusing in particular, on decorators, their know-how and their coordination method, as much as the costume preparation dispositive.
Apparatus and dispositive differ in the place they allocate to technique and lead us to very different questions. The dispositive enables us to expose a potential of reproducible technical activities.
1.1.3.Technical activities: best practice, effectiveness?
The dispositive, according to Bruno Bachimont, ignores the artistic dimension which seems to us however linked to the definition of technique. Art, in its old sense, produces just like techne, effects of consistency. As Kant (1724–1804) will say again regarding fine arts themselves, an artwork is, as such, anything but produced by chance, and this is why it can be beautiful or useful (Kant, 2009). In addition, the purpose of this art form that we call technique is often to protect us from what we call life’s “ups and downs”, namely from potential unfortunate events, such as bad weather without shelter or clothing to protect us. Art and nature are then jointly opposed to chance due to their regular nature, namely their compliance with rules: “best practices” control human poetic practices, while the “laws of nature” govern natural phenomena and enable explanations of them (Nodé-Langlois, 2010, p. 8)27. Techne is the opposite of the term tuche, differentiating efficient act from mere chance. Technique is not just a tool; it also integrates the action performed with, or even without, technical objects. Technique, in that sense, belongs more to poiesis (the act of creating) than techne, the physical manufacturing. Marcel Mauss28 (1950) defines techniques as “effective traditional actions” (pp. 371–372). He develops this definition in a study on body techniques that gather “all the socially acquired muscular habits: way of walking, sitting, sleeping, swimming, running”29 (Haudricourt, 1987, p. 57)30 wherein the technical object is not necessarily integrated.
Technique is then linked to activity. It includes in it the notion of effectiveness to be differentiated from the term usefulness in order to understand well the meaning of technique:
“To be effective, according to the dictionary, is ‘to produce the effect expected’, and only that. There is an effective way to skip a stone, since beginners do not succeed first time, but stone skipping does not have any usefulness, unless the fun out of it is considered as useful”31 (Sigaut, 2003)32.
For Cornélius Castoriadis (1978), “techne as ‘production’ or ‘physical manufacturing’ quickly becomes production or effective doing, generally appropriate (not necessarily linked to a material product), the way of doing consequential to such production, the skill making it possible, the productive know-how related to an activity and (based on Herodotus, Pindar and the Greek Tragedies) know-how in general, and therefore the effective method, manner and way of doing”33,34 (p. 223).35
Dispositives include then technical activities developed by humans, with or without tools or instruments.
We have not clearly identified so far the purpose of a technical activity. In some cases, it takes part in the implementation to create an artwork or to facilitate the performance of operational tasks. If, in art, we tend to highlight the creation process of an artwork by the artist and the perception of spectators, we also tend to see the purely technical aspect of the object creation in industrial contexts. In fact, even objects made by machines can have aesthetic considerations. The work of industrial designers, for whom the object is certainly functional, illustrates this aesthetic and semiotic dimension. According to the definition developed by the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design, used by Patrick Fridenson (2010, p. 211)36:
“Design is a creative activity whose purpose is to present the multiple aspects of the quality of objects, processes and systems in which they are integrated during their lifecycle. This is why it is the main innovative humanizing factor of technologies and a key driver of economic and cultural exchanges”37.
Experts in this field bring an artistic, emotional and ergonomic touch to a functional object. They are integrated into the mechanical production device, especially providing their ideas during the product design phase. Dispositive necessarily includes a technical dimension implying aesthetic and artistic considerations. Conversely, numerous debates have noted the technical aspect of photography and cinema, especially to justify the fact that they belong to arts. Walter Benjamin38 (2008) talked, in particular, about artwork at the time of its technical reproducibility. Artworks offer a representation of the world which is compatible with the meaning of dispositive as a space which “mobilizes technical, plastic or poetic means to represent a reality which is conveyed to a public in a position to learn and judge”39 (Ortel40, 2008, p. 46)41.
1.2. Machines and dispositives: the place of humans
The machine automates activities that integrate humans to drive it and control the results obtained:
“Machine, as an automated apparatus, will then have provided its first model to the theory of dispositives: the photographing or filming apparatus is then, as such, a good example of it”42 (Vouilloux, 2007, p. 154).
The similarities making it possible to reconcile machine and dispositive are of several kinds. The first one is the existence of a close relationship unifying machines and humans. This relationship can be found in all dispositives, whether we consider an operational device designed to perform well-sequenced collective actions or a less confined sociotechnical dispositive. This relationship observed in more detail will allow us to differentiate machine from dispositive. In order to characterize well this relationship, we must first define tool and instrument.
1.2.1.Tool, instrument
A tool is generally an object that can be handled by one (or several43) individuals who use it to carry out an operation. A hammer is used to hammer a nail, a lawnmower to mow the lawn. A verb of action that describes the action that can be performed by the tool is associated with the tool. The latter can be a handmade or mass manufactured object. At the beginning of the 12th Century, the term ustilz was defined as “a piece of equipment, a necessary object which is taken on board for a trip” (CNRTL, “Outil”). From 1174, tool was defined as a “manufactured object used to do a job” (CNRTL, “Outil”). The first definitions thus insist on the usefulness of the object. A tool has generally a very specific function, which is not necessarily implemented. For Bernard Blandin44 (2002), the object becomes a tool when it is “used, through the relationship that is created with it in the usefulness register”45 (p. 63).
A wheelbarrow helps to transport materials and is, as such, a technical object. As an object independent from humans, it can be stored, acquired and bought. It is then integrated into various dispositives and loses in these contexts its primary function and its tool status to become an instrument. For example, when a hammer is placed with other objects on a shelf, it loses its primary function to integrate a storage logic.
The tool can then be diverted from its primary function’s. It is then instead referred to as an instrument46, because the technical purpose of the instrument is not necessarily included in its invention (unlike the tool). For example, a chair is designed at the beginning to sit, but it can be used as a ladder or a stage accessory. It then has more an instrumental value, a term that introduces a notion of use.
Use theorists showed how some tools are diverted from the function that motivated their design. This is how the observation of interactions between tool and user qualify the use possibilities of a tool. Work in science and technique anthropology made it possible to directly connect problems of use and design (Akrich, 1987; Akrich et al. 2006)47.
Jacques Perriault (2008)48 refers, with the expression “the use of logic”, to the “construction by the individual of the choice of an instrument and a type of use to do a project”, which opposes this logic to determinism and focuses on the freedom left to users. This logic takes into account the possible diversions by users. The following example of Jacques Perriault perfectly illustrates this point: at the time when broadcasting of television programs by satellite started, people diverted their couscous pot from its “normal” use to use it as a satellite dish that facilitated reception. This diversion49 is produced by a logic of use from people who perfectly understood the role of an antenna. Users are so familiar with the model of the antenna that they looked for common objects likely to correspond to it.
As for Pierre Rabardel50 (1995), he equates, as a first approximation, the instrument to an “artifact51 in situations” (p. 55).
He specifies the three centers engaged in situations of use of an instrument:
“The subject (user, operator, worker, agent, etc.), the instrument (tool, machine, system, utensil, product, etc.), the object towards which the action is directed by means of the instrument (matter, reality, object of the activity, work, other subject, etc.)”52 (Rabardel, 1995, p. 58).
The key point of the distinction between tool and instrument is mainly a point of view on the technical object. Instrument is the point of view regarding the technical object that takes into account the purpose of the object and what the subject does with it. Tool is a more descriptive point of view of the technical capacities and prowess of the object. At the stage of the invention, the object is called tool. It will be referred to as an instrument when users will have appropriated it (Rabardel, 1995) and will use it for a specific purpose. Gilbert Simondon53 adds another characteristic to the instrument. For him, the instrument is closely linked to the one who uses it. “The instrument extends and adapts sensory organs, it is a sensor and not an effector, it is use to collect information, while the tool is used to perform an action”54 (Rabardel 1995, p. 69). It seems to us that the instrument can act but only through the close relationship established with humans. The artisan mentioned by Gilbert Simondon, (1989) “is drowned in the tangible, engaged in material handling and sensitive existence”55 (p. 87). Artisans have a close relationship with their objects and the tools they handle, different from the relationship established between laborers56 and their tools that are mediated by machines.
We can wonder about the nature of the relationship unifying artisans to their tools or instruments. The link between the instrument and its user is a more intimate link than the one unifying humans and tool. The latter focuses on the utilitarian aspect and the instrument on the close link unifying humans and the technical object, which can take the shape of an emotional relationship, as is the case for the musician. The instrument also incorporates a learning dimension.
These tools and these instruments can be integrated into a dispositive whose purpose is to perform actions to produce an artwork, a service, a series of objects. According to the perspective of the researcher, the relationship established within the dispositive between technical objects and humans will be tools or instruments.
1.2.2.Dispositive, machine
We have differentiated a tool from an instrument because of a different view focused on the technical object. Is this distinction also applicable between machine and dispositive?
A machine has some autonomy in relation to humans. Once a human programmed or launched the machine, it can automatically operate. Let us consider the example of an assembly line for the manufacture of a car. Several humans are working and performing different activities. In this line, each operative has a very demanding task. It is the machine associated with a social monitoring organization that imposes on them mechanical gestures. The operative is assimilated to a chain link. If they deviate from their task, if they do not follow the required gestures, the machine malfunctions. Therefore, a control system to ensure the operation of the whole line is backing up the production line57. In order for the machine to be able to carry out the work it is responsible for, operatives are at its service and are bound by the vagaries of the machine. A very specific organization is then necessary for the proper conduct of operations. If the machine has to operate 24/7, its repair and proper operation require an organization adapted to these constraints. We can consider the machine as a resource, a means to organize tasks. The human actors of this system have little freedom, since it is the machine that imposes its rule. To assimilate the machine to a dispositive, we cannot just rely on a classic definition of the machine as a “tool carrier”, or the genealogy that makes it the heir of the tool. The machine can be reconciled with the characteristics of the dispositive if we immediately consider it as a social space which arranges humans “according to a binding mechanism, in order to draw collective energy to perform a social work”58 (Mumford, 1966)59. As for Simon Lemoine60, he considers the car assembly workshop as a dispositive which “controls space, gestures, scenes, distances, movements, roles, costumes, time and light”61 (Lemoine, 2013, p. 157), insisting on the binding framework established by it.
During the preindustrial and industrial era, we can consider the dispositive as a synonym of machine by reducing the human–technique relationship to a distant, cold or even alienating relationship for the individual, who has difficulty avoiding the constraints imposed by the machine without being excluded from the machine organization. The latter is a form of dispositive typical of the preindustrial and industrial era.
In the postmodern era, this characterization of the dispositive as a machine is no longer relevant; it is too restrictive. If the machine focuses on the automation of human actions and the oppressive rates imposed on operators, the dispositive can integrate humans within it to coordinate technical actions, or even expertise, which is not actually limited to mechanical actions.
The tools, just like the instruments, are objects that can be arranged in a dispositive. The human–technique relationship can be represented in this context by instruments integrated within a dispositive or by tools whose handling requires abilities and a physical or intellectual force from the operator, as the human actors remain free to move as long as they direct their actions toward the purpose.
1.2.3.Ability development
Until now, we have defined technical activity as a relationship specific to a tool or an instrument. We would like to insist on the impact of these activities on individuals and, in particular, on their skills62. Initially, both terms “art” and “technique” were respectively, derived from the Latin and Greek languages. Ars and τ́εχνη have in fact, in each of these two languages, exactly the same meaning:
“They generally refer to the exercise of a trade: more specifically, the ability acquired through learning, as well as the knowledge required by this exercise, and finally, the products themselves of all the specific modes of human work, both manual and intellectual”63 (Marc Le Bot, “Technique et art”, Encyclopaedia Universalis).
A dispositive organizes repetitions “of gestures, attitude and actions when confronted to specific situations”64 (Lemoine, 2013, p. 45). Jean-Samuel Beuscart and Ashveen Peerbaye65 consider a dispositive “as the actual ‘manufacturer’ of actors, the place where their qualities are tested”66. Both authors add that abilities emerge if one keeps regularly acting the same way.
Bénédicte Reynaud67 (1998) talks, on the other hand, about routine to refer to:
“the supreme stage of formalization and storage of practical knowledge
