STS Encounters in Pandemic Times

This short essay by the departing board of STS Italia (Italian Society of Science and Technology Studies) introduces a Special Section of the Journal collecting a set of writings that present and develop some of the key themes of the VIII STS Italia Conference, held in June 2021 as a virtual event. The Special Section features an invited essay by Dimitris Papadopulos and Andrea Ghelfi followed by a short commentary by Luigi Pellizzoni. In addition, the Section includes ten different “Conference Reflections” – as situated perspectives on the meeting – written by colleagues who had a major role in organizing the event, or who convened one of the conference thematic tracks. As a whole, the Conference Reflections help broaden and improve our understanding of the manner and extent in which contextualized meanings and local socio-material practices constitute the fabric of the socio-technical environments where we live, thus unveiling the inextricable entanglement of novel vulnerabilities and technoscience.