Hybridisation of knowledge put to the test by participatory science: the case of environmental crowdsensing

As an expression of mutual commitments between scientists and non-professional researchers, the articulation of knowledge in participatory research and science depends on the objectives of the PRS programme and the configurations mobilised (participatory, collaborative or contributory research). These dynamics also vary according to the socio-technical mechanisms used and the learning capacities of the groups enabled by the approach. This paper examines the socio-cognitive dimensions of participatory science and the processes of knowledge hybridisation that underpin them, based on a pragmatic approach to testing the programmes themselves. Applied to environmental crowdsensing (participatory metrology based on sensors and digital devices), this perspective proposes to understand these projects through the prism of transliteracy involving scientific, metrological, technological, semiotic and reflexive literacies. The hybridisation of measurements and fields of knowledge in the field of environmental monitoring remains a challenge that involves not only moving away from an extractivist approach, but also embracing the potential eco-political reconfiguration resulting from the pluralism of data and knowledge.