The Sciences Po Medialab
Access to sources of knowledge and information has been revolutionized
by the development, diversification and ongoing diffusion of new
digital technologies, and the scope and consequences of that revolution
grow more apparent with each passing day.
 Such
a sea change directly impacts on university establishments like
Sciences Po: hence our endeavors to work the “digital revolution”
into the core of our teaching and research programs.
Setting up a Medialab is the first step toward that end: a digital
equipment laboratory dedicated to all the new means of communication
and data generation born of the new information and communication
technologies.
Indeed, Sciences Po needs a resource and skills center with a
state-of-the-art infrastructure to enable teachers and researchers
at Sciences Po to discover the new technologies (from data processing,
analysis and generation to data communication), assess the possibilities
thereof for their own research and teaching methods, and test
their wider application.
It will be a “center of excellence” in and of itself,
furnishing new tools for quantitative and qualitative analysis
and applying them to the political sciences, while exploring new
techniques of occupying and analyzing cyberspace.
Without a place for experimentation, technology monitoring and
research, it is impossible to familiarize researchers with these
methods, which are indispensable to their work and careers.
So the point of the Medialab will be to sensitize the Sciences
Po academic community to the new technologies and serve as a support
center for experimentation, for the innovative projects of researchers
and teachers (technical support, technical and financial assistance
in project planning, networks etc.). To this end, the Medialab
will set up a technology watch adapted to Sciences Po’s
scientific pursuits, while pooling and rendering compatible the
various innovations made in what are often separate domains (document
production, database exploration, surveys, video processing, discussion
forums etc.).
Finally, the Medialab may prove instrumental in overhauling access
to documentary resources and in projecting Sciences Po into cyberspace.
The Medialab will be fitted out with state-of-the-art equipment,
specialized staff, a network of partners (research centers, engineering
schools, companies…) and eventually a business incubator.
 The
Medialab’s foremost partners are:
· L’école des Mines de Paris, Centre de sociologie
de l’innovation (CSI – Center for the Sociology of
Innovation)
· Télécom Paris (ENST), Département
Sciences humaines et sociales (Social Sciences Department) and
Groupe des écoles des télécommunications
(GET) (Telecommunication Schools Group)
· L’université de technologie (UTC) de Compiègne,
COSTECH (Connaissance, Organisation et Systèmes TECHniques)
· Lutin-userlab for digital information technology at the
Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie – La Villette
· Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge,
Mass., via Vincent Lepinay, Assistant Professor (STS)
· Harvard University, Department of the History of Science,
via Peter Galison, Professor of the History of Science and Physics.
Last updated:
4/06/09
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