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On The Cover: Invasive Sparrows and the American Bird Box Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Matthew Holmes
abstract: The cover image for this issue of Technology and Culture depicts how bird boxes became contested technologies in the United States. The early twentieth-century image shows a pair of house sparrows (Passer domesticus)— an introduced species—taking over a bird box intended for native birds. But the claim that sparrows seized bird boxes and other nesting places to the detriment of American birds
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(Re)thinking Repairs in the Longue Durée Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Gianenrico Bernasconi, Guillaume Carnino, Liliane Hilaire-Pérez, Olivier Raveux
abstract: The history of repairs underscores the complexity of time through the practices of reusing and adapting objects. While this research field primarily focuses on the contemporary period, its close ties to present-day life risk obscuring the historical depth of these practices and the stakes they hold in various societies. How can we incorporate a truly historical perspective into our understanding
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Between Innovation and Resistance: The Role of Guilds in Early Modern Italian Ribbon Manufacturing Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Andrea Caracausi
abstract: The historiographical debate about the influence of guilds on economic development and innovation lacks consensus. Scholars are divided: some argue that guilds fostered a positive environment for technological innovation through privileges that ensured profits for inventors, while others underline the guilds’ role in stifling innovation to protect their interests. This article undertakes
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Bird Boxes and Sparrow Traps: The Technological Regulation of Avian Life in the United States Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Matthew Holmes
abstract: Only a few decades after its introduction to the United States in the mid-nineteenth century, the house sparrow was considered a pest that drove away native birds. Its downfall is representative of a story familiar to scholars of animals and technology who have studied the methods used to control or exclude unwanted species from both rural and urban areas. The case of the house sparrow, however
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Scrapbooks as Sites of Technology: The Women's Institute and the Material Culture of 1960s Rural England Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Cherish Watton, Tiia Sahrakorpi
abstract: Using scrapbooks created by members of the Women’s Institute in England in 1965, this article offers a rare insight into women’s lived experience and interaction with new technologies and services, in domestic and communal spaces, which show how rural women diligently recorded the new behaviors, emotions, and challenges surrounding rural life. Scrapbookers show multiple and sometimes contradictory
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Crucibles of Craft: Home Workshops and Leisurely Striving in Twentieth-Century U.S. Woodworking Magazines Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Len Kuffert
abstract: With more leisure time in the early to mid-twentieth century, more people in industrialized countries took up hobbies. One hobby—woodworking—became a favorite among men, especially homeowners. Beyond the familiar “do-it-yourselfers” there was an audience eager to learn about woodworking, and magazine publishers encouraged them to acquire new skills and home machinery. American publishers
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Visualizing Black Telephone Users: Technological Whiteness and Racial Exclusion in Bell System Advertising Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Josh Lauer
abstract: This study considers the broad implications of white technological modernity as a mode of symbolic and systemic exclusion. The visual absence of Black telephone users in mass-market advertising—and the struggle to make them visible—underscores the exclusionary power of technological whiteness and its lasting effects on conceptions of Black technology users, communities, and innovation. In
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Rays of Death and Visions of Life: Ultrasound Narratives, Risk Evaluations, and Prenatal Imaging Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Annika Berg
abstract: Diagnostic ultrasound visualization was initially developed and introduced as a more benign alternative to X-rays and is today established as a harmless routine procedure and tool for risk management, but as this article shows, it took several decades to overcome the popular notion that ultrasound itself was a high-risk technology, a potentially deadly weapon. Swedish newspaper material provides
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Historiography: Why Should Historians Pay More Attention to Philosophy of Technology? Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Eric Schatzberg
abstract: The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Technology marks the maturity of the philosophy of technology, which has lagged behind the history of technology as a distinct field. The book’s thirty-two chapters span almost seven hundred pages, written by thirty-four authors from twelve countries. Shannon Vallor, professor of philosophy at University of Edinburgh, edited the volume and wrote its excellent
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Da Vinci Medal Address: Material Political Economy Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Donald MacKenzie
abstract: On the occasion of the award of the author’s da Vinci Medal in 2022, this article sketches a perspective, material political economy, employed by the author, explaining it by drawing on Marc Bloch’s classic account of the dispute in European feudalism between milling grain on watermills or windmills controlled by feudal superiors, who could exact fees, and common people’s use of hand mills
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Microhistories of Technology: Making the World by Mikael Hård (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Corinna R. Unger
Reviewed by: Microhistories of Technology: Making the World by Mikael Hård Corinna R. Unger (bio) Microhistories of Technology: Making the World By Mikael Hård. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2023. Pp. xx + 290. In the preface to his new book, Mikael Hård describes how his approach to the history of technology has evolved over the decades. He started out with a conviction that nineteenth- and twentieth-century
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The Diffusion of "Small" Western Technologies in the Middle East: Invention, Use and Need in the 19th and 20th Centuries by M. Kupferschmidt (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Leor Halevi
Reviewed by: The Diffusion of “Small” Western Technologies in the Middle East: Invention, Use and Need in the 19th and 20th Centuries by M. Kupferschmidt Leor Halevi (bio) The Diffusion of “Small” Western Technologies in the Middle East: Invention, Use and Need in the 19th and 20th Centuries By Uri M. Kupferschmidt. Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2023. Pp. xii + 278. This book deals with the transfer
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Moving Crops and the Scales of History by Francesca Bray et al (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Harro Maat
Reviewed by: Moving Crops and the Scales of History by Francesca Bray et al Harro Maat (bio) Moving Crops and the Scales of History By Francesca Bray, Barbara Hahn, John Bosco Lourdusamy, and Tiago Saraiva. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2023. Pp. 352. Four renowned historians of technology have delivered a wonderful and inspiring collection of crop histories. The book is important for more than
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African Environmental Crisis: A History of Science for Development by Gufu Oba (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Rohini Patel
Reviewed by: African Environmental Crisis: A History of Science for Development by Gufu Oba Rohini Patel (bio) African Environmental Crisis: A History of Science for Development By Gufu Oba. Abingdon: Routledge, 2020. Pp. 258. Historian and environmental scholar Gufu Oba’s African Environmental Crisis is an excellent analysis of the unfolding and longevity of the “African environmental crisis hypothesis”
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The Cyborg Caribbean: Techno-Dominance in Twenty-First-Century Cuban, Dominican, and Puerto Rican Science Fiction by Samuel Ginsburg (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Michael Niblett
Reviewed by: The Cyborg Caribbean: Techno-Dominance in Twenty-First-Century Cuban, Dominican, and Puerto Rican Science Fiction by Samuel Ginsburg Michael Niblett (bio) The Cyborg Caribbean: Techno-Dominance in Twenty-First-Century Cuban, Dominican, and Puerto Rican Science Fiction By Samuel Ginsburg. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2023. Pp. 170. Recent years have seen a remarkable surge in
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Mexican Icarus: Aviation and the Modernization of Mexican Identity, 1928–1960 by Peter B. Soland (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Michael K. Bess
Reviewed by: Mexican Icarus: Aviation and the Modernization of Mexican Identity, 1928–1960 by Peter B. Soland Michael K. Bess (bio) Mexican Icarus: Aviation and the Modernization of Mexican Identity, 1928–1960 By Peter B. Soland. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2023. Pp. 256. Peter B. Soland’s Mexican Icarus explores the intersection of culture, technology, and celebrity in modernizing
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Modernity at the Movies: Cinema-Going in Buenos Aires and Santiago, 1915–1945 by Camila Gatica Mizala (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Cecilia Maas
Reviewed by: Modernity at the Movies: Cinema-Going in Buenos Aires and Santiago, 1915–1945 by Camila Gatica Mizala Cecilia Maas (bio) Modernity at the Movies: Cinema-Going in Buenos Aires and Santiago, 1915–1945 By Camila Gatica Mizala. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2023. Pp. 266. Modernity at the Movies sheds light on a largely unexplored facet of film history: the intricacies of exhibition
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Hollywood's Embassies: How Movie Theaters Projected American Power Around the Globe by Ross Melnick (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Giles Scott-Smith
Reviewed by: Hollywood’s Embassies: How Movie Theaters Projected American Power Around the Globe by Ross Melnick Giles Scott-Smith (bio) Hollywood’s Embassies: How Movie Theaters Projected American Power Around the Globe By Ross Melnick. New York: Columbia University Press, 2022. Pp. 503. This is a bold work of substantial proportions, setting out as it does to reframe our understanding of Hollywood
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Communications in Turkey and the Ottoman Empire: A Critical History by Burçe Çelik (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Sirri Emrah Üçer
Reviewed by: Communications in Turkey and the Ottoman Empire: A Critical History by Burçe Çelik Sirri Emrah Üçer (bio) Communications in Turkey and the Ottoman Empire: A Critical History By Burçe Çelik. Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2023. Pp. 254. Burçe Çelik’s book represents a novel and bold contribution to the field of Turkish studies by providing a comprehensive two-century-long history
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Media Ruins: Cambodian Postwar Media Reconstruction and the Geopolitics of Technology by Margaret Jack (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Peter Manning
Reviewed by: Media Ruins: Cambodian Postwar Media Reconstruction and the Geopolitics of Technology by Margaret Jack Peter Manning (bio) Media Ruins: Cambodian Postwar Media Reconstruction and the Geopolitics of Technology By Margaret Jack. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2023. Pp. 264. It is still common today for news coverage, film, and much human rights scholarship to depict Cambodia as a broken, corrupt
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In the Land of Marvels: Science, Fabricated Realities, and Industrial Espionage in the Age of the Grand Tour by Paola Bertucci (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Alan Marshall
Reviewed by: In the Land of Marvels: Science, Fabricated Realities, and Industrial Espionage in the Age of the Grand Tour by Paola Bertucci Alan Marshall (bio) In the Land of Marvels: Science, Fabricated Realities, and Industrial Espionage in the Age of the Grand Tour By Paola Bertucci. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2023. Pp. 168. Paola Bertucci’s book is a well-written and engaging study
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Collective Wisdom: Collecting in the Early Modern Academy ed. by Anna Marie Roos and Vera Keller (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Aurélien Ruellet
Reviewed by: Collective Wisdom: Collecting in the Early Modern Academy ed. by Anna Marie Roos and Vera Keller Aurélien Ruellet (bio) Collective Wisdom: Collecting in the Early Modern Academy Edited by Anna Marie Roos and Vera Keller. Turnhout: Brepols, 2022. Pp. 323. In January 1742, a mummified ibis was presented at a meeting of the Egyptian Society in London, then carefully dissected a few days later
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Scientific Advice to the Nineteenth-Century British State by Roland Jackson (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Edward J. Gillin
Reviewed by: Scientific Advice to the Nineteenth-Century British State by Roland Jackson Edward J. Gillin (bio) Scientific Advice to the Nineteenth-Century British State By Roland Jackson. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2023. Pp. 464. For anyone interested in the history of scientific advice and government, the past three or four years have delivered an endless stream of gobbets, thanks
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Franklin Ford Collection ed. by Dominique Trudel and Juliette De Maeyer (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Will Mari
Reviewed by: Franklin Ford Collection ed. by Dominique Trudel and Juliette De Maeyer Will Mari (bio) Franklin Ford Collection Edited by Dominique Trudel and Juliette De Maeyer. Bethlehem: Mediastudies.press, 2023. Pp. 297. In this unique assembly of the key writings of American poly-math and philosopher Franklin Ford (1849–1918), Dominique Trudel (Audencia Business School) and Juliette De Maeyer (University
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Technology and the Common Good: The Unity and Division of a Democratic Society by Allen W. Batteau (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Thomas A. Stapleford
Reviewed by: Technology and the Common Good: The Unity and Division of a Democratic Society by Allen W. Batteau Thomas A. Stapleford (bio) Technology and the Common Good: The Unity and Division of a Democratic Society By Allen W. Batteau. New York: Berghahn Books, 2022. Pp. 205. Technology and the Common Good provides an ambitious but sometimes loosely argued synthesis that combines critical perspectives
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The Cult of Creativity: A Surprisingly Recent History by Samuel W. Franklin, and: The Creativity Complex: Art, Tech, and the Seduction of an Idea by Shannon Steen (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Stina Teilmann-Lock
Reviewed by: The Cult of Creativity: A Surprisingly Recent History by Samuel W. Franklin, and: The Creativity Complex: Art, Tech, and the Seduction of an Idea by Shannon Steen Stina Teilmann-Lock (bio) The Cult of Creativity: A Surprisingly Recent History By Samuel W. Franklin. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2023. Pp. 253. The Creativity Complex: Art, Tech, and the Seduction of an Idea By Shannon
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The Dangerous Art of Text Mining: A Methodology for Digital History by Jo Guldi (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Melvin Wevers
Reviewed by: The Dangerous Art of Text Mining: A Methodology for Digital History by Jo Guldi Melvin Wevers (bio) The Dangerous Art of Text Mining: A Methodology for Digital History By Jo Guldi. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023. Pp. 465. In The Dangerous Art of Text Mining, historian Jo Guldi explores the application of text mining in historical research. Text mining, a method for quantitatively
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The Family Planning Association and Contraceptive Science and Technology in Mid-Twentieth-Century Britain by Natasha Szuhan (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Agata Ignaciuk
Reviewed by: The Family Planning Association and Contraceptive Science and Technology in Mid-Twentieth-Century Britain by Natasha Szuhan Agata Ignaciuk (bio) The Family Planning Association and Contraceptive Science and Technology in Mid-Twentieth-Century Britain By Natasha Szuhan. Cham: Palgrave MacMillan, 2023. Pp. 294. Natasha Szuhan’s objective in this history of the Family Planning Association
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Radiophilia by Carolyn Birdsall (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Richard Legay
Reviewed by: Radiophilia by Carolyn Birdsall Richard Legay (bio) Radiophilia By Carolyn Birdsall. New York: Bloomsbury, 2023. Pp. 279. Just in time to mark radio’s first century in many countries, Carolyn Birdsall’s Radiophilia is a particularly welcome and original addition to the scholarship of both radio studies and broadcasting history. This ambitious book introduces a new concept, “radiophilia
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Learning with Light and Shadows: Educational Lantern and Film Projection, 1860–1990 ed. by Nelleke Teughels and Kaat Wils (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Deac Rossell
Reviewed by: Learning with Light and Shadows: Educational Lantern and Film Projection, 1860–1990 ed. by Nelleke Teughels and Kaat Wils Deac Rossell (bio) Learning with Light and Shadows: Educational Lantern and Film Projection, 1860–1990 Edited by Nelleke Teughels and Kaat Wils. Turnhout: Brepols, 2023. Pp. 267. The second of three books spawned by the nationally funded B-Magic collaborations between
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Planetarien: Wunder der Technik—Techniken des Wunderns [Planetariums: Miracles of technology—techniques of wonder] by Helen Ahner (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Hans-Christian Von Herrmann
Reviewed by: Planetarien: Wunder der Technik—Techniken des Wunderns [Planetariums: Miracles of technology—techniques of wonder] by Helen Ahner Hans-Christian Von Herrmann (bio) Planetarien: Wunder der Technik—Techniken des Wunderns [Planetariums: Miracles of technology—techniques of wonder] By Helen Ahner. Göttingen: Wallstein Verlag, 2023. Pp. 366. The first optomechanical planetarium was opened in
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How Computers Entered the Classroom, 1960–2000: Historical Perspectives ed. by Carmen Flury and Michael Geiss (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Stephen Petrina
Reviewed by: How Computers Entered the Classroom, 1960–2000: Historical Perspectives ed. by Carmen Flury and Michael Geiss Stephen Petrina (bio) How Computers Entered the Classroom, 1960–2000: Historical Perspectives Edited by Carmen Flury and Michael Geiss. Berlin: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2023. Pp. 240. Exactly how did computers enter classrooms across the world in the 1960s through the 1990s? Were
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The Philosopher of Palo Alto: Mark Weiser, Xerox PARC, and the Original Internet of Things by John Tinnell (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Andreas Hepp
Reviewed by: The Philosopher of Palo Alto: Mark Weiser, Xerox PARC, and the Original Internet of Things by John Tinnell Andreas Hepp (bio) The Philosopher of Palo Alto: Mark Weiser, Xerox PARC, and the Original Internet of Things By John Tinnell. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2023. Pp. 368. Historical research has provided an important understanding of how and in which social and cultural contexts
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Science, Technology, and Irish Modernism ed. by Kathryn Conrad, Cóilín Parsons and Julie McCormick Weng (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Hamid Farahmandian
Reviewed by: Science, Technology, and Irish Modernism ed. by Kathryn Conrad, Cóilín Parsons and Julie McCormick Weng Hamid Farahmandian (bio) Science, Technology, and Irish Modernism Edited by Kathryn Conrad, Cóilín Parsons, and Julie McCormick Weng. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2019. Pp. xxii + 406. The common misunderstanding regarding the depth of interest that Irish writers had in science
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Im Medienlabor der US-amerikanischen Industrieforschung: Die gemeinsamen Wurzeln von Massenmedien und Bürokratie 1870–1950 [In the media laboratory of US-American industrial research: The common roots of mass media and bureaucracy 1870–1950] by Nadine Taha (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Felix Selgert
Reviewed by: Im Medienlabor der US-amerikanischen Industrieforschung: Die gemeinsamen Wurzeln von Massenmedien und Bürokratie 1870–1950 [In the media laboratory of US-American industrial research: The common roots of mass media and bureaucracy 1870–1950] by Nadine Taha Felix Selgert (bio) Im Medienlabor der US-amerikanischen Industrieforschung: Die gemeinsamen Wurzeln von Massenmedien und Bürokratie
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Media and the Mind: Art, Science, and Notebooks as Paper Machines, 1700–1830 by Matthew Daniel Eddy (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Manon C. Williams
Reviewed by: Media and the Mind: Art, Science, and Notebooks as Paper Machines, 1700–1830 by Matthew Daniel Eddy Manon C. Williams (bio) Media and the Mind: Art, Science, and Notebooks as Paper Machines, 1700–1830 By Matthew Daniel Eddy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2023. Pp. 423. In Media and the Mind, Matthew Daniel Eddy provides an insightful and thorough exploration of student notebooks
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Rendered Obsolete: Energy Culture and the Afterlife of US Whaling by Jamie L. Jones (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Amy Kohout
Reviewed by: Rendered Obsolete: Energy Culture and the Afterlife of US Whaling by Jamie L. Jones Amy Kohout (bio) Rendered Obsolete: Energy Culture and the Afterlife of US Whaling By Jamie L. Jones. Raleigh: University of North Carolina Press, 2023. Pp. 244. It might be because my family has been watching The Crown, but as soon as I read that George H. Newton and Fred J. Engel-hardt orchestrated the
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Atomic Environments: Nuclear Technologies, the Natural World, and Policymaking, 1945–1960 by Neil S. Oatsvall (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 E. Jerry Jessee
Reviewed by: Atomic Environments: Nuclear Technologies, the Natural World, and Policymaking, 1945–1960 by Neil S. Oatsvall E. Jerry Jessee (bio) Atomic Environments: Nuclear Technologies, the Natural World, and Policymaking, 1945–1960 By Neil S. Oatsvall. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2023. Pp. 264. The world was irrevocably changed on July 16, 1945, when the Manhattan Project detonated
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British Nuclear Weapons and the Test Ban: Squaring the Circle of Defence and Arms Control, 1974–82 by John Walker (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Christoph Laucht
Reviewed by: British Nuclear Weapons and the Test Ban: Squaring the Circle of Defence and Arms Control, 1974–82 by John Walker Christoph Laucht (bio) British Nuclear Weapons and the Test Ban: Squaring the Circle of Defence and Arms Control, 1974–82 By John Walker. Abingdon: Routledge, 2023. Pp. 174. John Walker’s latest book marks an important study of the complex relationship between nuclear weapons
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The Dallas Story: The North American Aviation Plant and Industrial Mobilization during World War II by Terrance Furgerson (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 David Foster
Reviewed by: The Dallas Story: The North American Aviation Plant and Industrial Mobilization during World War II by Terrance Furgerson David Foster (bio) The Dallas Story: The North American Aviation Plant and Industrial Mobilization during World War II By Terrance Furgerson. Denton: University of North Texas Press, 2023. Pp. xii + 403. Today, Dallas is a major hub within the global aerospace network
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Dark Star: A New History of the Space Shuttle by Matthew H. Hersch (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Michael J. Neufeld
Reviewed by: Dark Star: A New History of the Space Shuttle by Matthew H. Hersch Michael J. Neufeld (bio) Dark Star: A New History of the Space Shuttle By Matthew H. Hersch. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2023. Pp. 315. Dark Star (a title taken from an obscure science fiction movie) is not a comprehensive technical history of NASA’s space shuttle program, nor does it contain much new information. (For that
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Architecture's Model Environments by Lisa Moffitt (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-07-19 Kristine Grønning Ericson
Reviewed by: Architecture’s Model Environments by Lisa Moffitt Kristine Grønning Ericson (bio) Architecture’s Model Environments By Lisa Moffitt. London: UCL Press, 2023. Pp. 209. In contemporary architectural practice, common methods for representing and analyzing airflow include computer-generated simulations and static two-dimensional diagrams. These techniques have limitations, particularly for
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Cover Essay: La Gente, Controllers of the Universe Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Peter Soland
abstract: Diego Rivera's mural El hombre controlador del universo (1934) can be read as foreshadowing the anxieties and optimisms about atomic power that shaped popular culture in Mexico during the nuclear age. In epic fashion, Rivera's vision affirms the agency of ordinary people in the face of a technological epoch while eerily anticipating the bipolarity of the Cold War, themes that would be revisited
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Seeds, Dams, and Khipus: Latin America's Eclectic Recent History of Technology Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Pedro Reynolds-Cuéllar, Diego Cerna-Aragon, Eden Medina
abstract: Scholarship on Latin America's history of technology has expanded significantly in recent years. By reviewing articles in English- and Spanish-language journals from 2012 to the first half of 2023, we illustrate the emerging themes, geographies, and methodologies in this literature. The four main themes we identify are industrialization, institutions and policies, infrastructure, and moving
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Everyday Resistance to White Supremacy: Walking and Cycling While Black in Springs, South Africa, 1950s–1970s Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Njogu Morgan
abstract: This article explores why white supremacists regard self-directed mobility by people of color as threatening by examining a controversy that unfolded in a mining town called Springs during the apartheid era in South Africa. Drawing on archives, oral histories, and testimonies, it shows how white residents of Selcourt and Selection Park, along with their allies in the town council, prevented
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Tropicalizing the Portable Radio: Electronics and the U.S. Military's Battle against Fungi in the Pacific War Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Boyd Ruamcharoen
abstract: As the U.S. military became embroiled in "jungle warfare" across the Pacific during World War II, it was caught off guard by the rapid deterioration of materials and equipment in the tropics, where the air was hot, humid, and teeming with fungal spores. This article tells the story of how American scientists and engineers understood the "tropical deterioration" of portable radios and electronics
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Seeds of the Settler Colony: How Peasant and Kazakh Knowledge, Environment, and Bureaucracy Shaped Steppe Agronomy in the Late Russian Empire Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 John B. Seitz
abstract: At the turn of the twentieth century, Russian imperial officials hoped to transform the Kazakh Steppe from a zone of pastoral nomadism into a zone of sedentary grain farms. They planned to accomplish this transformation by importing peasants from European Russia and settling them in the steppe along with advanced scientific agricultural practices, equipment, and infrastructure. It was a project
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Fragile Foundations: Tracing Argentina's Semiconductor Saga amid Institutional Turmoil Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Fernanda A. Soca, Mariana E. Di Bello
abstract: This article suggests that the persistent pattern of political and economic instability in Argentina has affected the development of semiconductor technology in Argentina, affecting secure resources, financial stability, and appropriate institutional frameworks. This article reconstructs Argentina's history of semiconductor technology to understand the initial research, development, and production
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Dreaming of a Bright Future: Statistics, Disaster, and the Birth of Energopolitics in 1930s Chile Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Mónica Humeres, Magdalena Gil
abstract: In 1939, directly after the worst earthquake in the country's history, the Chilean state began implementing an electrification program. This plan shaped energy goals for years to come and defined the interconnected grid that dominates the country's energy infrastructure today. Based on extensive archival work, this article describes the birth of energopolitics in the country, using technology
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Revolution and Resistance in the Desert: The Guggenheim System's Impact on Nitrate Mining and Society in Atacama, 1926–31 Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Damir Galaz-Mandakovic, Francisco Rivera
abstract: In 1926, during an economic crisis that severely impacted the mining industry, Guggenheim Brothers, the Guggenheim family business, implemented a new technological system to extract saltpeter from the Atacama Desert in northern Chile. Known as the Guggenheim system, this cutting-edge technological innovation had a significant impact on regional society and facilitated the introduction of
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Water, Wealth, and Engineering Wisdom: Shaping Tucumán's Agricultural Future, 1890–1910 Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Carlos Salvador Dimas
abstract: Focusing on Argentina's sugarcane province of Tucumán from 1870 to 1910, this article examines the processes of engineering professionalization in Argentina and its application to pressing environmental problems. Engineers were central to the processes through which elites in Latin America sought to attract foreign investment in agriculture, integrate their countries into the global economy
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Engineering History in Latin America: A Review of Spanish-Language Books Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 J. Justin Castro
abstract: This review essay examines five Spanish-language books published in Latin America on the emergence of engineering in the region. Focusing on a period from roughly 1850 to 1970, these works share themes of foreigners and foreign education, nation-state construction, and social conceptions of prestige. This research suggests that throughout Latin America foreign educators and models were prominent
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La ciudad en movimiento: Estudios históricos sobre transporte colectivo y movilidad en Santiago de Chile, siglos XIX y XX [The city on the move: Historical studies on public transport and mobility in Santiago de Chile, nineteenth and twentieth centuries] ed. by Simón Castillo and Marcelo Mardones (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Rodrigo Booth
Reviewed by: La ciudad en movimiento: Estudios históricos sobre transporte colectivo y movilidad en Santiago de Chile, siglos XIX y XX [The city on the move: Historical studies on public transport and mobility in Santiago de Chile, nineteenth and twentieth centuries] ed. by Simón Castillo and Marcelo Mardones Rodrigo Booth (bio) La ciudad en movimiento: Estudios históricos sobre transporte colectivo
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El sol al servicio de la humanidad: Historia de la energía solar en Chile [The sun in the service of humanity: History of solar energy in Chile] ed. by Mauricio Osses, Cecilia Ibarra, and Bárbara Silva (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Diego Arango López
Reviewed by: El sol al servicio de la humanidad: Historia de la energía solar en Chile [The sun in the service of humanity: History of solar energy in Chile] ed. by Mauricio Osses, Cecilia Ibarra, and Bárbara Silva Diego Arango López (bio) El sol al servicio de la humanidad: Historia de la energía solar en Chile [The sun in the service of humanity: History of solar energy in Chile] Edited by Mauricio
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Con los pies en el surco: Instituciones estatales y actores de la ciencia agropecuaria en La Pampa (1958–1983) [With feet in the furrow: State institutions and actors of agricultural science in La Pampa (1958–1983)] by Federico Martocci (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 María Cecilia Zuleta
Reviewed by: Con los pies en el surco: Instituciones estatales y actores de la ciencia agropecuaria en La Pampa (1958–1983) [With feet in the furrow: State institutions and actors of agricultural science in La Pampa (1958–1983)] by Federico Martocci María Cecilia Zuleta (bio) Con los pies en el surco: Instituciones estatales y actores de la ciencia agropecuaria en La Pampa (1958–1983) [With feet in
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Conjuring the State: Public Health Encounters in Highland Ecuador, 1908–1945 by A. Kim Clark (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Jasmine Gideon
Reviewed by: Conjuring the State: Public Health Encounters in Highland Ecuador, 1908–1945 by A. Kim Clark Jasmine Gideon (bio) Conjuring the State: Public Health Encounters in Highland Ecuador, 1908–1945 By A. Kim Clark. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2023. Pp. xiii + 208. In this highly engaging book, Clark explores the creation of a public health service in Ecuador in the early twentieth
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Living with Algorithms: Agency and User Culture in Costa Rica by Ignacio Siles (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Mónica Humeres
Reviewed by: Living with Algorithms: Agency and User Culture in Costa Rica by Ignacio Siles Mónica Humeres (bio) Living with Algorithms: Agency and User Culture in Costa Rica By Ignacio Siles. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2023. Pp. 234. What does it mean for people in a Latin American country to live in a datafied society? Bearing this question in mind, Ignacio Siles devoted five years to empirically
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Fueling Mexico: Energy and Environment, 1850–1950 by Germán Vergara, and: Electrifying Mexico: Technology and the Transformation of a Modern City by Diana J. Montaño (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Helge Wendt
Reviewed by: Fueling Mexico: Energy and Environment, 1850–1950 by Germán Vergara, and: Electrifying Mexico: Technology and the Transformation of a Modern City by Diana J. Montaño Helge Wendt (bio) Fueling Mexico: Energy and Environment, 1850–1950 By Germán Vergara. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021. Pp. 322. Electrifying Mexico: Technology and the Transformation of a Modern City By Diana
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¡Alerta! Engineering on Shaky Ground by Elizabeth Reddy (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Magdalena Gil
Reviewed by: ¡Alerta! Engineering on Shaky Ground by Elizabeth Reddy Magdalena Gil (bio) ¡Alerta! Engineering on Shaky Ground By Elizabeth Reddy. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2023. Pp. 226. ¡Alerta! is a well-researched and engaging book that provides valuable insights into the socio-technical challenges of using technology to mitigate the impact of extreme natural events such as earthquakes. The book
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El pensamiento sobre la técnica en México [Thinking about technology in Mexico] ed. by Irving Samadhi Aguilar Rocha and José Francisco Barrón Tovar (review) Technol. Cult. (IF 0.8) Pub Date : 2024-05-09 Israel G. Solares
Reviewed by: El pensamiento sobre la técnica en México [Thinking about technology in Mexico] ed. by Irving Samadhi Aguilar Rocha and José Francisco Barrón Tovar Israel G. Solares (bio) El pensamiento sobre la técnica en México [Thinking about technology in Mexico] Edited by Irving Samadhi Aguilar Rocha and José Francisco Barrón Tovar. Mexico City: Bonilla Artigas Editores/Universidad Autónoma del Estado