Script Analysis
Script analysis, developed by Madeleine Akrich with Bruno Latour, treats technological artefacts like texts. When designers build a device, they inscribe a 'script' into it—a set of assumptions about who the users will be, what skills and motives they have, and how the world around the device is arranged—and the artefact then prescribes roles and conduct for the people and things it encounters. 'De-scription' is the analyst's method of reading that script back out of the object and comparing the user the designer projected with the user who actually appears, revealing the often invisible politics built into ordinary things.
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Sources
- Akrich, M. (1992). The de-scription of technical objects. In W. E. Bijker & J. Law (Eds.), Shaping Technology/Building Society (pp. 205-224). MIT Press. ISBN: 9780262023382
- Akrich, M., & Latour, B. (1992). A summary of a convenient vocabulary for the semiotics of human and nonhuman assemblies. In W. E. Bijker & J. Law (Eds.), Shaping Technology/Building Society (pp. 259-264). MIT Press. ISBN: 9780262023382
How to cite this page
ScholarGate. (2026, June 22). Script Analysis of Technological Artefacts (De-scription). ScholarGate. https://scholargate.app/en/science-technology-studies/script-analysis-technology
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Set this method beside its closest kin and read them side by side — the library lays the books on the table; the choice is yours.
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