Date/Time
Date(s) - 11/01/2024
12:30 pm - 1:30 pm

Location
ABB C520

The “valley of death” is a cornerstone metaphor in discourses of innovation, venture capital and technology transfer. It refers to perceived gaps between basic research and the development of new products, platforms, spaces and services. The valley of death might be considered, what Emily Martin (1991) has called, a “sleeping metaphor,” one so common in innovation discourse that its deeper meanings and implications get lost. This paper argues that the metaphor has been woken up in biomedical cultures. Biomedical valleys of death do not refer just to figurative deaths of start-up companies, or failures of venture capitalists and “angel” financiers to transform basic research into successful products. Biomedical valleys of death are also populated by the physiologically dead and dying bodies of model organisms and people, including those for whom new means, modes and methods of diagnosing and treating disease will never be translated quickly enough.

Speaker Bio

 Cameron Murray is an interdisciplinary ethnographer of science and medicine. He focuses on imbalances of power and knowledge between biomedical expertise and the lived experiences of communities meant to benefit from new biomedical practices, spaces and innovations. He is a

Postdoctoral Fellow in McMaster’s School of Interdisciplinary Science and the

International Research Network for the Study of Science & Belief in Society.

Logistics

The seminar will take place in the SIS Meeting Room, ABB C520 at 12:30 on Thursday 11 Jan.

If you are unable to attend in-person, you will be able to join remotely by clicking the below Teams link.

Click here to join the meeting

Meeting ID: 271 908 778 655

Passcode: isxLnK

For further information please contact the Seminar Series organiser, Dr Alexander Hall (halla45@mcmaster.ca)