Paper short abstract:

SCI use as objetive tool to represent science is controversial. Here we assume papers as technoscientific object in the context of ANT. We propose three networks tracking of scientific communication: manifested, underlying, and associative, to rethink both positives and negatives arguments about SCI.

Paper long abstract:

International Bibliographic Indexes (IBIs) like Science Citation Index (SCI), have play an important role in the world of science. However, IBIs increased use has been controversial and it has raised positives and negatives standpoints regarding their use as objective tools to represent and track the state of science. This has led to the emergence of deep tensions between both sides, expressed in oppositions like: IBIs are/are not objective, scientific, and universal. However, it is paradoxical that both sides are presented as mutually exclusive when in reality the complaints of both consider aspects that coexist in the communication process. We present evidence of this coexistence. In our approach research papers are conceived as a techno-scientific object in the context of actor-network theory and metaphors tracking: optical, industrial, and associative, to analyze scientific communication networks. The aim of this study is twofold: first, we propose three networks tracking of scientific communication: manifested, underlying, and associative, to reconsider both positives and negatives allegations about IBIs, and second, we encourage to rethink the opposition mentioned before, starting from a more relational rather than essentialist approach, to the process of scientific communication.

Key words: STS; Scientometrics; Actor-Network; Journals.