
Cyborg farmers : embodied understandings of precision agriculture
- Author
- Daniel van der Velden (UGent) , Laurens Klerkx, Joost Dessein (UGent) and Lies Debruyne
- Organization
- Abstract
- Precision agriculture is often seen as disembodied and placeless, promised to either bring about a fourth agricultural revolution or as the start of dystopian rural futures, where farmers and their knowledge will be replaced by machines. A growing body of literature shows more nuanced ways of working with precision agriculture. This illustrates the need to investigate how, and under which conditions, precision agriculture is integrated and internalised by farmers. Based on 25 in-depth interviews with male Dutch crop farmers, contractors, researchers, and ag-tech developers, we develop the concept of the cyborg farmer, who embodies the use of precision technology while maintaining an intimate relationship with agro-ecological context. This approach challenges the mind-body dichotomy in that the cognitive is not understood as primary, as emotions and the materiality of the body are taken seriously. This perspective emphasises the importance of embodied knowledge in how farmers interpret precision agriculture data. Our findings highlight the productive tension between data-driven elements of precision agriculture and the embodied and intuitive understanding of agro-ecological context. This productive tension consists of the successful integration of different forms of knowledge by the cyborg farmer, where embodied sense-making and precision agriculture data are integrated into the formation of useable knowledge. The cyborg farmer maintains farmer agency and resists the dominance of algorithmic rationality over other forms of knowledge.
- Keywords
- assemblages, digital agriculture, embodied knowledge, more-than-representational knowledge, new materialism, process-relational perspectives, Agriculture 4.0, precision agriculture, BIG DATA, KNOWLEDGE, CONSTRUCTION, TECHNOLOGIES, FOOD
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Citation
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication: http://hdl.handle.net/1854/LU-01HJ8QZJJ6N5HCZYJF1APZ3XDA
- MLA
- van der Velden, Daniel, et al. “Cyborg Farmers : Embodied Understandings of Precision Agriculture.” SOCIOLOGIA RURALIS, vol. 64, no. 1, 2024, pp. 3–21, doi:10.1111/soru.12456.
- APA
- van der Velden, D., Klerkx, L., Dessein, J., & Debruyne, L. (2024). Cyborg farmers : embodied understandings of precision agriculture. SOCIOLOGIA RURALIS, 64(1), 3–21. https://doi.org/10.1111/soru.12456
- Chicago author-date
- Velden, Daniel van der, Laurens Klerkx, Joost Dessein, and Lies Debruyne. 2024. “Cyborg Farmers : Embodied Understandings of Precision Agriculture.” SOCIOLOGIA RURALIS 64 (1): 3–21. https://doi.org/10.1111/soru.12456.
- Chicago author-date (all authors)
- van der Velden, Daniel, Laurens Klerkx, Joost Dessein, and Lies Debruyne. 2024. “Cyborg Farmers : Embodied Understandings of Precision Agriculture.” SOCIOLOGIA RURALIS 64 (1): 3–21. doi:10.1111/soru.12456.
- Vancouver
- 1.van der Velden D, Klerkx L, Dessein J, Debruyne L. Cyborg farmers : embodied understandings of precision agriculture. SOCIOLOGIA RURALIS. 2024;64(1):3–21.
- IEEE
- [1]D. van der Velden, L. Klerkx, J. Dessein, and L. Debruyne, “Cyborg farmers : embodied understandings of precision agriculture,” SOCIOLOGIA RURALIS, vol. 64, no. 1, pp. 3–21, 2024.
@article{01HJ8QZJJ6N5HCZYJF1APZ3XDA, abstract = {{Precision agriculture is often seen as disembodied and placeless, promised to either bring about a fourth agricultural revolution or as the start of dystopian rural futures, where farmers and their knowledge will be replaced by machines. A growing body of literature shows more nuanced ways of working with precision agriculture. This illustrates the need to investigate how, and under which conditions, precision agriculture is integrated and internalised by farmers. Based on 25 in-depth interviews with male Dutch crop farmers, contractors, researchers, and ag-tech developers, we develop the concept of the cyborg farmer, who embodies the use of precision technology while maintaining an intimate relationship with agro-ecological context. This approach challenges the mind-body dichotomy in that the cognitive is not understood as primary, as emotions and the materiality of the body are taken seriously. This perspective emphasises the importance of embodied knowledge in how farmers interpret precision agriculture data. Our findings highlight the productive tension between data-driven elements of precision agriculture and the embodied and intuitive understanding of agro-ecological context. This productive tension consists of the successful integration of different forms of knowledge by the cyborg farmer, where embodied sense-making and precision agriculture data are integrated into the formation of useable knowledge. The cyborg farmer maintains farmer agency and resists the dominance of algorithmic rationality over other forms of knowledge.}}, author = {{van der Velden, Daniel and Klerkx, Laurens and Dessein, Joost and Debruyne, Lies}}, issn = {{0038-0199}}, journal = {{SOCIOLOGIA RURALIS}}, keywords = {{assemblages,digital agriculture,embodied knowledge,more-than-representational knowledge,new materialism,process-relational perspectives,Agriculture 4.0,precision agriculture,BIG DATA,KNOWLEDGE,CONSTRUCTION,TECHNOLOGIES,FOOD}}, language = {{eng}}, number = {{1}}, pages = {{3--21}}, title = {{Cyborg farmers : embodied understandings of precision agriculture}}, url = {{http://doi.org/10.1111/soru.12456}}, volume = {{64}}, year = {{2024}}, }
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