Venturing outside the comfort zone: The 20th anniversary of STS Italia, a project born out of detachment, torque, and diaspora

Although none of us members of the STS Italia Steering Board is new to spokesperson challenges, it’s difficult describing the mixture of anxiety and excitement that accompanies the writing of a piece for Tecnoscienza celebrating the 20th anniversary of the Italian Association of Science and Technology Studies. Anxiety is rooted in the awareness that any attempt at reconstructing the history of STS Italia since its inception would inevitably do wrong to many. If any, such an enterprise should be a collective one, and cannot be only consigned to a presidential address. On the other hand, excitement spreads from the possibility to share our vision of what STS Italia has meant for us over these twenty years, and how we see its future.