Portable altar, temporary lab-in-the-field, mobile court – each travelling truth-spot did its job to make people believe. Certain shared understandings acquired legitimacy as they emerged from ordinary places provisionally made special by the momentary unpacking of transformative stuff – Aztecs get aligned with the tenets of Catholic missionaries; scientific data from Antarctic ice convince US Congress to ban lead from gasoline; disputatious neighbours in a remote Chinese village reach an agreeable legal settlement. But lasting churches still get built, and so do brick-and-mortar laboratories and courthouses – often at great expense, and in locations strategically chosen to accentuate their persuasive powers.
Thomas Gieryn, Truth is also a place.
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