Wyatt, SME (Sally)

Sally Wyatt originally studied economics at McGill University, Canada and Sussex University, England. She received her PhD in science and technology studies from Maastricht University in 1998. She has worked at the Universities of Sussex (1980-86), Brighton (1988-90), East London (1990-99) and Amsterdam (1999-2006) as well as at the British Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) (1986-88). Between 2006-17, she worked for the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW), and was Programme Leader of its e-Humanities Group. Between 2005-2010, Wyatt co-ordinated PhD training in the Dutch Research School for Science, Technology and Modern Culture (WTMC), and was the Academic Director between 2011-17. Wyatt was the international co-ordinator for ESST (European Master’s Programme on Society, Science and Technology) between 1996-99 and its President between 2008-2011. She was President of EASST (European Association for the Study of Science and Technology. Wyatt is now Professor of Digital Cultures, and Associate Dean for research at FASoS.

Expertise

Research Profile

Wyatt has worked on the social aspects of digital technologies for many years. She is particularly interested in the internet and social exclusion and the ways in which people incorporate the internet into their practices for finding health information.

Together with Andrew Webster, she was founding co-editor of a book series, Health, Technology and Society published by Palgrave Macmillan.

Wyatt has received major research grants from the Dutch Research Council, the UK Economic and Social Research Council and the Canadian Social Science and Humanities Research Council. She has acted as an adviser to the European Commission’s Science in Society programme as well as to several European research councils interested in establishing and/or evaluating social science research about new information and communication technologies.

At present, Wyatt is working on two NWO-funded research projects. One is about the role of AI in image-based clinical decision making (RAIDIO) with Flora Lysen and colleagues from University Medical Centre Utrecht. The second is about bias in media recommender systems (TAIM) with colleagues from the Department of Advanced Computer Science, UM, the University of Amsterdam, and the media company RTL. Within FASoS, Annika Richterich and Daniella Pauly Jensen are involved.

Education Projects

one of the founding contributors to the BA Digital Society. First cohort graduated in 2022.

Teaching

PhD supervision

- Cecilia Schenetti, Maastricht University, provisional title: EU soft borders in Africa. How migration campaigns affect Senegalese youth’s migration imaginaries and sense of social justice (expected completion 2024) (co-promoter: Valentina Mazzucato)

- Kathleen Gregory, Maastricht University, Findable and reusable? Data discovery practices in research (awarded March 2021, cum laude) (funded by NWO Creative Industries Programme) (co-promoters: Andrea Scharnhorst & Paul Groth)

- Anna Bon, Intervention or Collaboration? Redesigning Information and Communication Technologies for Development. Maastricht University, (awarded December 2020) (co-promoter: Hans Akkermans)

· Claudia Egher, Maastricht University, provisional title: Mental Health Expertise Online: The enactment of expertise on major depression and bipolar disorder on online platforms in English and French (awarded December 2019) (recipient of NWO award for ‘PhDs in the humanities’, 2014) (co-promoter: Tamar Sharon)

· Rafael Bienia, Maastricht University, provisional title: Role-playing games and cultural citizenship (awarded April 2016) (co-promoter: Karin Wenz) (funded by NWO)

· Jess Bier, Maastricht University, provisional title: Mapping Israel, Mapping Palestine: Space and Materiality in Digital Cartography (awarded April 2014) (co-promoter: Bas van Heur) (recipient of ERC starter grant)

· Matthijs Kouw, Maastricht University, provisional title: Simulation and the vulnerability of technological culture (awarded December 2012) (co-promoter: Wiebe Bijker)

· Niels van Doorn, ASCoR, UvA, Digital Spaces, Material Traces. Investigating the performance of gender, sexuality, and embodiment on internet platforms that feature user-generated content (awarded February 2010) (promoter: Liesbet van Zoonen) (recipient of NWO Rubicon Award and ERC Starter grant)

· Vanessa Dirksen, FEE, UvA, Social imaginaries of technology and work. A Connective ethnography (awarded September 2007) (promoter: Rik Maes)

· Tamara Witschge, ASCoR, UvA, In/difference online: The issue of immigration on the Internet (awarded May 2007) (promoter: Kees Brants)

· Caroline Nevejan, ASCoR, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Presence and the design of trust (awarded April 2007) (promoter: Cees Hamelink)

· Helen Kennedy, School of Media and Cultural Studies, University of East London, Digits and subjects: autobiographies of multimedia and identity (awarded 2003) (co-supervisor: Nod Miller)

Maastricht University (current)

· Supervision of CAST and ESST masters’ dissertations (2007-cont.)

Previous Teaching

Netherlands Graduate Research School for Science, Technology and Modern Culture (WTMC) (2005-10) (see www.wtmc.net)

plus lots of teaching about the internet, information society, etc at University of Amsterdam (1999-2006); University of East London (1989-1999) and Universities of Brighton & Sussex before that.

Work for third parties

Chair of Programme Committee for Fostering Responsible Research Practice at ZonMw
Chair of Computational Sciences Advisory Board at Lorentz Centre
Membership of editorial board at Science, Technology & Human Values
Membership of editorial board at Big Data & Society

Additional roles & tasks

Professor of Digital Cultures