Josephson Fish Sticks, Sports Bras, and Aluminum Cans

The Politics of Everyday Technologies
Erscheinungsjahr 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4214-1784-4
Verlag: Johns Hopkins University Press
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 0 Seiten, Format (B × H): 152 mm x 229 mm

What do bananas, rocket ships, bicycles, and French fries have in common?

Who would have guessed that the first sports bra was made out of two jockstraps sewn together or that it succeeded because of federal anti-discrimination laws? What do simple decisions about where to build a road or whether to buy into the carbon economy have to do with Hurricane Katrina or the Fukushima nuclear disaster? How did massive flood control projects on the Mississippi River and New Deal dams on the Columbia River lead to the ubiquity of high fructose corn syrup? And what explains the creation—and continued popularity—of the humble fish stick?

In Fish Sticks, Sports Bras, and Aluminum Cans, historian Paul R. Josephson explores the surprising origins, political contexts, and social meanings of ordinary objects. Drawing on archival materials, technical journals, interviews, and field research, this engaging collection of essays reveals the forces that shape (and are shaped by) everyday objects.

Ultimately, Josephson suggests that the most familiar and comfortable objects—sugar and aluminum, for example, which are inextricably tied together by their linked history of slavery and colonialism—may have the more astounding and troubling origins. Students of consumer studies and the history of technology, as well as scholars and general readers, will be captivated by Josephson’s insights into the complex relationship between society and technology.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Josephson, Paul R.

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Wissenschafts- und Universitätsgeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Kultur- und Ideengeschichte
• Technische Wissenschaften Technik Allgemein Technikgeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Geschichtliche Themen Mentalitäts- und Sozialgeschichte
• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaften: Allgemeines Geschichte der Naturwissenschaften, Formalen Wissenschaften & Technik

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. The Ocean's Hot Dog
2. The Sports Bra
3. Sugar, Bananas, and Aluminum Cans
4. Mass-Produced Nutrition
5. Technology and (Natural) Disasters
6. Big Artifacts
Conclusion
Notes
Suggested Further Reading
Index

Über Autor(innen)

Josephson, Paul R.
Paul R. Josephson is an associate professor of history and chair of the International Studies Program at Colby College. He is the author of Resources under Regimes: Technology, Environment, and the State; Industrialized Nature: Brute Force Technology and the Transformation of the Natural World; and Red Atom: Russia's Nuclear Power Program from Stalin to Today.

Paul R. Josephson is a professor of history at Colby College. He is the author of Would Trotsky Wear a Bluetooth? Technological Utopianism under Socialism, 1917–1989 and The Conquest of the Russian Arctic.