ABOUT THIS BOOK

From flammable tap water and sick livestock to the recent onset of hundreds of earthquakes in Oklahoma, the impact of fracking in the United States is far-reaching and deeply felt. In Fractivism Sara Ann Wylie traces the history of fracking and the ways scientists and everyday people are coming together to hold accountable an industry that has managed to evade regulation. Beginning her story in Colorado, Wylie shows how nonprofits, landowners, and community organizers are creating novel digital platforms and databases to track unconventional oil and gas well development and document fracking's environmental and human health impacts. These platforms model alternative approaches for academic and grassroots engagement with the government and the fossil fuel industry. A call to action, Fractivism outlines a way forward for not just the fifteen million Americans who live within a mile of an unconventional oil or gas well, but for the planet as a whole.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Sara Ann Wylie is Assistant Professor of Sociology, Anthropology, and Health Sciences at Northeastern University.

REVIEWS

"Wylie makes an exciting and timely scholarly contribution that is relevant well beyond the scope of those concerned with the anthropology of energy. This book is useful to social scientists to inform research and teaching on topics spanning science and technology studies, energy policy, sustainability,environmental health, digital humanities, and applied and design anthropology. The relevance of this work also extends beyond academia, and would be of great value not only to gas patch communities that are still struggling to demonstrate the links between chemical exposure and illness, but to community leaders and activists that are engaged in a growing array of citizen science initiatives."

-- Amanda Poole Conservation and Society

"Fractivism is an incredibly well-sourced book that presents and represents a kind of historical account of the newer applications of fracking technology (fracking reservoirs isn’t actually new) and various approaches scientists and communities are using to hold exploration companies accountable for the environmental problems resulting from fracking operations. . . . Well worth reading. Highly recommended. All readers."

-- M. S. Field Choice

"Written with a strong sense of conviction and urgency. . . . An important and timely book that offers essential reading for students, researchers, and activists interested in civic science and the David-and-Goliath struggle of the popular epidemiology movement to help grassroots groups document the toxic burden posed by petrochemical and fossil fuel facilities."

-- Anthony E. Ladd Mobilization

"It is a credit to the book that every chapter has its share of galling information about corporate malfeasance. . . . As forests burn and famine grows, the need for Wylie’s radical science and activism is ever more necessary."

-- Miles Taylor Synoptique

"Fracktivism is a meticulously researched and supported text. . . . For academics, lawmakers, and activists, Fracktivism may give either the insight, data, or motivation for a new platform in piercing the 'regimes of imperceptibility.'"

-- Victor Hall Natural Resources Journal

"Fractivism truly is an interdisciplinary work, combining insights and methodologies from anthropology, sociology, science and technology studies, environmental science, and physiology. Wylie does a good job of integrating these perspectives to produce a compelling and detailed guide for collaborative environmental justice work."

-- Kristen M. Schorpp Nature and Culture

"Positioning matters of science and technology at the heart of environmental justice and the study of extractive industries, Wylie contributes to important debates in anthropology, applied social sciences and STS which concern the methodological and conceptual ability of these disciplines to challenge dominant paradigms."

-- Anna Szolucha Cambridge Journal of Anthropology

"Fractivism is especially useful for the classroom and for interdisciplinary researchers and students alike to understand how 'STS in practice' can be a model for material projects that unite those who want to try and find solutions with others—not in isolation. This book is a tool for those looking to utilize research, data, or analytical methods for social and environmental justice movements broadly."

-- Leslie Quintanilla Catalyst

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface ix
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction. An STS Analysis of Natural Gas Development in the United States 1
1. Securing the Natural Gas Boom: Oilfield Service Companies and Hydraulic Fracturing's Regulatory Exemptions 19
2. Methods for Following Chemicals: Seeing a Disruptive System and Forming a Disruptive Science 41
3. HEIRship: TEDX and Collective Inheritance 64
4. Stimulating Debate: Fracking, HEIRship, and TEDX's Generative Database 86
5. Industrial Relations and an Introduction to STS in Practice 115
6. ExtrAct: A Case Study in Methods for STS in Practice 137
7. Landman Report Card: Developing Web Tools for Socially Contentious Issues 165
8. From LRC to WellWatch: Designing Infrastructure for Participatory and Recursive Publics 191
9. WellWatch: Reflections on Designing Digital Media for Multisited Para-ethnography of Industrial Systems 219
10. The Fossil-Fuel Connection (with coauthor Len Albright) 247
Conclusion. Corporate Bodies and Chemical Bonds: A Call for Industrial Embodiment 279
Notes 305
References 333
Index 383

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