Maya Hey

I am a trans- and inter-disciplinary scholar interested in the ways that microbes shape and are shaped by science and society. With microbes as my analytical object of study, my work engages with themes such as the social construction of knowledge, infrastructures for collaboration, and taking a critical stance towards the hype of microbial innovations. For my PhD (funded by the government of Canada, completed 2021), I studied Japanese processes of fermentation by making ferments and doing the work firsthand. My own politics about pedagogy led me to co-found the community fff|food feminism fermentation, which brings scholarly, artistic, and activist perspectives into a shared learning space.

As a leading member of the Centre for the Social Study of Microbes (CSSM), I represent an emerging subfield of STS. As the STS community continues to grow and diffract, I am vested in:

The future of conferencing: how do we want to stay in conversation? Whether we aim for regional hubs or dedicated research streams, how we gather will inevitably shape the conversations to be had, and with whom.

Building capacity for Making & Doing: who can we produce and express the diversity of STS? Extant practices in Making and Doing could amplify efforts across conference sessions, pedagogical tools, activism, and beyond.

Open educational resources: what pedagogical materials can we develop with/for others? As people continue to join in on STS conversations, the question of foundational ‘texts’ will affect which resources will shape the future of STS—and who can access them.