Re: [-empyre-] What an appropriate discussion.

[Jeff Sonstein <jeffs@it.rit.edu>]

Lachlan Brown wrote:

> Saul,  Wake up, lad. Technology is cultural! Technology does not
> 'shape' society. Au contrare. Does anyone have any references for Saul
> critiquing 'technological determinism'?

I must differ with your analysis of this issue...
for I think it simplistic to argue simply that
one "shapes" the other...
indeed I would argue that
there is a feedback loop going on
with culture and technology
shaping and altering each other

"Technology does not 'shape' society"???
ask any family in the British Isles during industrialization about
what happened to family and community structure
when [for example] weaving moved (due to technological change)
from the family working at home into a factory setting

there is an interesting book by Christopher Lasch
entitled "Haven in a Heartless World"
in which he addresses [amongst other things]
the issue of how technological changes of the past
[specifically, the Industrial Revolution]
have changed the perceptions of
as well as the operational realities of
family and home and community...
for example
there is a lot of evidence that
definitions of familial relations in Europe
[social categories of "blood" relatedness, for example]
were altered as a result of technological change

this is not a "one way street" of course
for just as technological revolutions shape
social structures and relations
and the "stock of knowledge at hand"
[see Berger and Luckmann]
so do socio-cultural forces in their turn shape
technological innovations and applications
[see for example Levathes' "When China Ruled the Seas"
 and Schama's excellent re-examination of
 the French Revolution in
 "Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution"]

jeffs

--
Jeffrey Sonstein
Assistant Professor of Information Technology
Rochester Institute of Technology
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