AIME starts from Actor Network Theory but then goes on in noticing that the trails of actor netwrok theory have different qualities that are highlighted through speaking about modes of existence.
One has the impression that in this laying out of networks there is a dynamics that is not followed in AIME. My impression is that activity theory expresses how trajectories "react" among themselves and make "granules" , which in activity theory are called "activity systems". Here is a poetic (a poetry in lines in my view ) expression of a activity system
In my understanding this approach complements AIME (and it help us see the anthropologist in the book in another light. Boy! she is so lonely! no colleagues to speak with, no friends, no lover. Activity theory is bursting in human engagement from the start)
First an introduction
Here is
1. Video on the use of activity theory in anthropology (by Mary van der Riet)
An introduction to Activity Theory (Part 1) https://vimeo.com/14632565
Using activity theory to understand human behaviour (Part 2 of Introduction to Activity Theory)
https://vimeo.com/14634203
It is a good start
2. The presentation in Engestrom's web page
http://www.edu.helsinki.fi/activity/pages/chatanddwr/activitysystem/
3. A classic and a good presentation of Engestrom's version of activity theory
Learning by expanding: http://lchc.ucsd.edu/mca/Paper/Engestrom/Learning-by-Expanding.pdf
Activity theory and learning at work: http://www.helsinki.fi/cradle/documents/Engestrom%20Publ/Chapter%20for%20Malloch%20book.pdf
4. Two criticisms (accessible by Google scholar)
Jones, P. E. (2011). Activity, Activity Theory, and the Marxian Legacy. InMarxism and Education (pp. 193-213). Palgrave Macmillan US.
Bakhurst, D. (2009). Reflections on activity theory. Educational Review, 61(2), 197-210.
I think also that the following is useful as a background
Bakhurst, D. (1995). Social being and the human essence: An unresolved issue in Soviet philosophy. Studies in East European Thought, 47(1-2), 3-60.
http://lchc.ucsd.edu/MCA/Mail/xmcamail.2012_01.dir/pdfvCGAgsTwMD.pdf
Some common points:
1. Both give lot of emphasis on contradicitons. What is called 3rd generation activity theory (which I think is its current form) starts having as smaller unit of analysis not the activity system but interacting activity systems (at least two). We see the same in AIME's mode crossing
2. There is a similar background concern on anthropogenesis. It is part of BAkhurst criticism I think, refering to the starting point of activity theory in Vygotsky's work and later the work of Ilyenkov that this part is not so clear in Engestrom's version but probably it is still there. In AIME there are many points where anthropogenesis is dealt with (actually the conditions of human comming forth but not necessary in [REF] time- this actually is the problem of how to deal with time that is important inboth approaches) although now perhaps through the emphasis on Gaia this may not be so upfront
3. They are both concerned with politics, with finding ways out of current dead ends
4. Latour and Engestrom are close in age
So how could one proceed? One way is to aplly the approach of activity theory to AIME (Engestrom and his team have worked a lot with actual work places). I think it is a very strong tool in that direction
Another way is to see for example if pseudo-subjects and pseudo -objects can combine in ways suggested by activity theory and if the links can be "coloured" based on the different modes of existence
But an even better way, and closer to the spirit of activity theory would be if the two research teams, in case they found common ground, would collaborate
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What a great day, St Vlasios and St. Theodora
