The Project-ed Community

Abstract

AbstractProjects have become crucial devices in the practice and governance of research. Drawing on the participant ethnography of a two-year interdisciplinary project on microbial bioenergy, this chapter inquires how projectification translates into collective research dynamics. It argues that to understand what projects are and how they affect research practices and communities, it is necessary to look beyond their influence on the organisation of research work. Seeking to delineate the project as a group, the chapter analyses three versions of the project-ed community: in documents, in institutional arrangements, and in daily research. This shows that projects cannot be reduced to temporary arenas of research. They are also argumentative devices that justify and display the excellence and relevance of specific scientific endeavours, as well as projection devices – they serve to imagine future research communities and to start building them. In that, projects are highly strategic entities that integrate scientific practices into coherent narratives to further the interests and ambitions of various parties; but they are also enmeshed in practical matters, because to build communities, researchers have to develop concrete repertoires that are materially embodied.