Disciplining the Data Scientist Role: Professional Emergence as Local Action

• In Event: 2268 - Professions and Networks

Abstract

The "data scientist" role has gained sudden and widespread recognition as a new profession. Although every profession has had to define its identity, how novel roles emerge remains poorly understood. This analysis mobilizes extensive field observations of New York City’s technology scene to study how data scientists have constructed a publicly salient professional role. The data science case is particularly puzzling because it claims distinct status despite drawing on established expertise. While data scientists acknowledge older intellectual roots, they propose distinct interpretations that follow the same rhetorical structure across diverse applications and address outsiders and their problems directly. Their explanations of data science’s benefits, legitimacy and coherence reflect "local action" and "abductive reasoning." These mechanisms ensure a consistent rhetoric and attract external attention. This study offers the first account of professional identity construction as it unfolds. The results shed new light on the longstanding sociological question of professional emergence and explain how the discipline of fleeting and indirect interactions defines a salient community. Understanding this process helps transform technical expertise that penetrates various aspects of public and private life through ubiquitous data applications into an equitable professional role.

Author

• Philipp Soeren Brandt, University of Mannheim