Staying with the Trouble of Transforming Our Field Shadow :: [DIA]show(C/C) from #MeTooSTS / #WeDoSTS

[Claudia Schwarz]

Dear sisters, brothers,

and everyone in between

and beyond the categories

we have inherited,

 

wherever you may be located

on this beautiful planet we call Earth

and this field we call STS,

I hope this message finds you well.

 

I am writing because I feel a responsibility to inform you about what has unfolded since I first began speaking publicly, in November 2022, as a survivor of gender-based harm, abuse of power, and epistemic violence in STS through a Medium post that initiated the #MeTooSTS / #WeDoSTS movement. Back then, my primary concern was to encourage critical reflection on the forms of harm, exclusion, and abuse of power that I and others had experienced within the Harvard STS programme and the Science and Democracy network. Much has happened since.

 

Over the past year, I have taken on the difficult task of further writing this story from my own humble, situated scholar-survivor perspective. The result is an experimental transmedia piece: The “[DIA]show(C/C) from #MeTooSTS / #WeDoSTS: A Transformative Movement Through Post-Traumatic Academia”. I take you on a journey to reflect together on harm, accountability, solidarity, and the challenges of building more democratic and caring academic worlds. I believe that this deserves broader attention within our field.

To give you a sense of the journey, here is a brief overview of the main stations:

·      The [DIA]show introduces the concepts of field shadow and field shadow work to trace the hidden harms, exclusions, and contradictions that shape academic fields such as STS.

·      The [DIA]show reflexively explores the artistic and autoethnographic practices through which it was conceived, curated, and assembled.

·      The [DIA]show recounts what unfolded after the social media storm on Twitter/X: the legal retaliation, intimidation, and complaint processes that followed, and my efforts to find pathways toward healing and justice beyond institutional responses that too often reproduce the very harms they claim to address.

·      The [DIA]show reflects on the burdens and responsibilities that emerged through becoming a public survivor-activist, including encounters with other survivors, the weight of carrying difficult knowledge, questions of accountability, and the ongoing challenge of turning individual testimony into collective action and lasting change.

·      At its heart, however, the [DIA]show is about kinship and love. Building on feminist STS scholarship, I pay tribute to the companions, allies, and unexpected forms of support that helped make the emergence of #MeTooSTS / #WeDoSTS possible.

·      The [DIA]show documents community-building efforts, solidarities, conflicts, and controversies within Austrian, German-speaking, and European STS. Through episodes such as “Hamstergate” at the 2023 STS Austria conference, it demonstrates how field shadows are made visible, dissent is negotiated, and survivor-led interventions are received within academic communities.

·      The [DIA]show concludes with thoughts on transformative justice and an invitation to imagine how STS might engage its own field shadows more openly, courageously, and collectively.

 

You can access the [DIA]show here:

https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/qbts9_v1

 

I would be deeply grateful if you could download, read, discuss, and share it.

 

A huge thank you to everyone who has supported #MeTooSTS / #WeDoSTS over the years, whether quietly, loudly, visibly, or invisibly.

I believe this is not the moment to step back from the work that we started. On the contrary, now is an important moment to step forward.

Across the world, gender studies, feminist scholarship, diversity-equity-inclusion initiatives, and survivor-led movements are facing increasing hostility and political attacks. At the same time, academic freedom itself is under pressure. The questions raised by #MeTooSTS / #WeDoSTS therefore extend far beyond the experiences of a few individuals. They concern the kind of academic cultures we wish to inhabit and the futures we want to build together.

In a strange and troubling way, the recent history of the [DIA]show illustrates precisely these challenges. The piece was originally published in the Queer STS Forum at the end of last year, and then, after editorial corrections again in February this year. However, it was taken offline shortly afterwards following external pressure, despite having successfully passed peer-review and editorial processes. I find these developments deeply concerning, not only on a personal level, but also because they raise broader questions about academic freedom, institutional courage, and the capacity of our field to integrate and engage with uncomfortable testimony, critique, and dissent.

As someone who continues to experience professional consequences for speaking out, I cannot do this work alone. The future of survivor-led field shadow work in STS depends on collective support, solidarity, and participation.

I would therefore be very grateful for your ideas, contacts, and suggestions for academic journals, public scholarship venues, or other platforms where (parts of) the [DIA]show might find a new home and where we might continue the conversations it seeks to open.

If the concept of field shadow work resonates with you; if you believe that accountability, repair, and transformative justice should become central concerns for our field; or if you simply feel that these conversations should not disappear from public view, I hope you will join us in carrying this work forward.

With continuing hope for more democratic futures in STS and beyond,

Claudia Gertraud Schwarz

Vienna, Austria
3 June 2026

The field shadows are not mine alone.
They belong to all of us.
And so does the responsibility and opportunity to bring them into the light and transform them into more just futures for our field.

LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/claudia-gertraud-schwarz-81919424b/

Please share the attached meme.

P.S. Not sorry for X-posting.

☺

(c/c)