Editing Actor–network theory (section)

=== Actor/Actant ===
An actor (actant) is something that acts or to which activity is granted by others. It implies no motivation of human individual actors nor of humans in general. An actant can literally be anything provided it is granted to be the source of action.<ref name=":1">{{Cite journal|last=Jackson|first=Sharon|date=2015|title=Toward an analytical and methodological understanding of actor-network|url=https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/293865084.pdf|journal=Journal of Arts and Humanities|volume=4|issue=2|pages=29–44}}</ref> In another word, an actor, in this circumstance, is considered as any entity that does things. For example, in the "Pasteur Network", [[microorganism]]s are not inert, they cause unsterilized materials to ferment while leaving behind sterilized materials not affected. If they took other actions, that is, if they did not cooperate with [[Louis Pasteur|Pasteur]] – if they did not take action (at least according to Pasteur's intentions) – then Pasteur's story may be a bit different. It is in this sense that Latour can refer to microorganisms as actors.<ref name=":1" />

Under the framework of ANT, the [[principle of generalized symmetry]]<ref name="Scallops">{{Cite journal |last=Callon |first=Michel |date=May 1984 |title=Some Elements of a Sociology of Translation: Domestication of the Scallops and the Fishermen of St Brieuc Bay |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-954X.1984.tb00113.x |journal=The Sociological Review |language=en |volume=32 |issue=1_suppl |pages=196–233 |doi=10.1111/j.1467-954X.1984.tb00113.x |s2cid=15055718 |issn=0038-0261|url-access=subscription }}</ref> requires all entities must be described in the same terms before a network is considered. Any differences between entities are generated in the network of relations, and do not exist before any network is applied.

==== Human actors ====
Human normally refers to human beings and their [[human behavior]]s.

==== Nonhuman actors ====
Traditionally, [[Non-human|nonhuman]] entities are creatures including plants, animals, geology, and natural forces, as well as a collective human making of arts, languages.<ref>{{Cite book |url=https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/B/bo9826233.html |title=Beyond Nature and Culture |publisher=University of Chicago Press |language=en}}</ref> In ANT, nonhuman covers multiple entities including things, objects, animals, natural phenomena, material structures, transportation devices, texts, and economic goods. But [[nonhuman actors]] do not cover entities such as humans, supernatural beings, and other symbolic objects in nature.<ref name="Sayes" />