Technology and Culture最新文献

{"title":"British Literature and Technology, 1600–1830 ed. by Kristin M. Girten and Aaron R. Hanlon (review)","authors":"Al Coppola","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926337","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926337","url":null,"abstract":"<p> <span>Reviewed by:</span> <ul> <li><!-- html_title --> <em>British Literature and Technology, 1600–1830</em> ed. by Kristin M. Girten and Aaron R. Hanlon <!-- /html_title --></li> <li> Al Coppola (bio) </li> </ul> <em>British Literature and Technology, 1600–1830</em> Edited by Kristin M. Girten and Aaron R. Hanlon. Lewisburg: Bucknell University Press, 2023. Pp. 216. <p>This volume collects eight articles exploring the relationship of literary texts and material realities, mostly in England, mainly during the long eighteenth century. Both of the editors and all of the contributors hold Ph.D.s in literature. So does the person who was asked to write this review. If only by virtue of these facts, this volume represents a provocation: What do a bunch of English professors have to contribute to the history of technology?</p> <p>If you read the thoughtful introduction by Girten and Hanlon, and especially Joseph Drury's deft afterword, \"On the Uses of the History of Technology for Literary Studies and Vice Versa,\" you'll get what strikes me as a darn good answer. The editors argue that some of the collected articles show how \"literary and aesthetic considerations contributed to the development of material technologies, while in others, the textual treatment of technology impacted how people understood and engaged with it\" (p. 10). As Drury writes, \"Technologies are ways of doing things, not just ways of knowing. As such, they extend deep into the rhythms of everyday life in a way that is less often the case with scientific knowledge\" (p. 164). Keying into the concept of affordance from design theory and the wealth of new formalist work in literary studies, which asserts that literary form \"<em>does</em> things, it doesn't simply mean things\" (p. 168), Drury argues that \"textual analysis [as] practiced by literary scholars\" is particularly suited to explore \"one of the key insights of modern science and technology studies\": that \"the function of a technical artifact depends on the particular circumstances of its use\" (p. 169). Attending to literary texts helps us investigate \"<em>imagined</em> uses of technologies\": showing us the futures that never came and the futures that yet might be, but also charting the widest circle of their reach. Not just the trials and tribulations of the innovators but also \"those who may have never had any contact with a technology but were nonetheless powerfully affected by it\" (p. 173).</p> <p>Great collections contain solid chapters that make a meaningful contribution to their subject. In this regard, this collection is more than worthy, particularly insofar as the authors employ science and technology studies to deepen the scholarly conversation about their literary objects of study. Exceptional collections do all that while gathering a body of work that shares a unity of purpose and exemplifies the theoretical approach and critical <strong>[End Page 709]</strong> interventions outlined by the editors. This collecti","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"25 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140939233","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Seeds of the Settler Colony: How Peasant and Kazakh Knowledge, Environment, and Bureaucracy Shaped Steppe Agronomy in the Late Russian Empire","authors":"John B. Seitz","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926314","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926314","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>abstract:</p><p>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 that linked steppe settlement and the Russian Empire to a global story of settler colonialism, science, and technology in the first decades of the twentieth century. An examination of this project through the lens of the expansion of grain farming reveals that the changes it wrought were not solely due to European science and technology but were contingent, dependent on local knowledge, the vagaries of climate, and adaptation to the realities of the steppe environment.</p></p>","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"45 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140939229","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Different Engines: Media Technologies From Latin America by Andrés Burbano (review)","authors":"Edgar Gómez-Cruz","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926332","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926332","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt; &lt;span&gt;Reviewed by:&lt;/span&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;li&gt;&lt;!-- html_title --&gt; &lt;em&gt;Different Engines: Media Technologies From Latin America&lt;/em&gt; by Andrés Burbano &lt;!-- /html_title --&gt;&lt;/li&gt; &lt;li&gt; Edgar Gómez-Cruz (bio) &lt;/li&gt; &lt;/ul&gt; &lt;em&gt;Different Engines: Media Technologies From Latin America&lt;/em&gt; By Andrés Burbano. Abingdon: Routledge, 2023. Pp. 220. &lt;p&gt;In &lt;em&gt;Different Engines&lt;/em&gt;, Colombian scholar Andrés Burbano invites readers to contemplate an intriguing alternative genealogy of pervasive technologies like photography, computer music, color television, programming languages, and physical computing by looking at technologies developed in Brazil, Colombia, Chile, and Mexico. Through this lens, Burbano unravels a concealed history of technological development, innovation, and creativity in Latin America, shedding light on the intersection of cultural, social, economic, and historical factors in the innovation process. In dispelling the notion that the Global South merely consumes technologies from the North, the book asserts that Latin America is a constant hub of creative innovation, often operating independently of market logics. The book not only serves as a historical account but, more importantly, invites readers to actively participate in the construction of media and technological futures rooted in and emanating from Latin America. The overarching message is a call to reconsider technological innovation not solely within the confines of global economic power centers but as a dynamic force that can emanate from diverse and unexpected sources. Thus, the lines between \"historically significant\" and \"historically successful\" are blurred.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Burbano employs a media archaeology perspective with an artistic sensibility, delving into the geopolitical, social, and personal circumstances surrounding the development of five distinct technologies, each of them developed in Latin America. Each chapter meticulously examines one of these technologies: photography, a color wheel for television, COMDASUAR (a personal computer), Lua (a programming language), and Wiring (an interface for physical computing). Channeling the role of an archaeologist revealing new artifacts, Burbano explores the inception, conditions, barriers, &lt;strong&gt;[End Page 697]&lt;/strong&gt; and logics behind each invention, providing a comprehensive understanding of how they \"failed\" or \"succeeded.\"&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;The book has two sections: \"Backtracking\" and \"Sidetracking.\" Each chapter aligns with the logic of its respective technology. Consequently, the chapters on photography and television read more like media histories, while others delve deeper into technical computational details. This approach transforms each chapter into a discrete story, with varying levels of readability.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;Different Engines&lt;/em&gt; goes beyond a historical exploration, intertwining personal involvement with the technologies discussed and creating a narrative that bridges historical analysis and hands-on experience. For example, Bu","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"32 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140939240","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Engineering History in Latin America: A Review of Spanish-Language Books","authors":"J. Justin Castro","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926319","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926319","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>abstract:</p><p>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 in early engineering programs and enterprises. However, many historians associate the growth of engineering, especially civil engineering, with increasing state consolidation and economic intervention. As social perceptions of the value of professional engineering changed, domestic engineers increasingly became important planners and mediators. Some engineers became state leaders. By contextualizing these works with other scholarship on the history of engineering, this review essay highlights new insights while suggesting the need for greater attention to gender, race, and labor; comparisons between developments in Latin America, Africa, and Asia; and more research on private-sector engineers.</p></p>","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"25 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140939515","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Giving Bodies Back to Data: Image Makers, Bricolage, and Reinvention in Magnetic Resonance Technology by Silvia Casini (review)","authors":"Annie Y. Patrick","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926335","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926335","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt; &lt;span&gt;Reviewed by:&lt;/span&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;li&gt;&lt;!-- html_title --&gt; &lt;em&gt;Giving Bodies Back to Data: Image Makers, Bricolage, and Reinvention in Magnetic Resonance Technology&lt;/em&gt; by Silvia Casini &lt;!-- /html_title --&gt;&lt;/li&gt; &lt;li&gt; Annie Y. Patrick (bio) &lt;/li&gt; &lt;/ul&gt; &lt;em&gt;Giving Bodies Back to Data: Image Makers, Bricolage, and Reinvention in Magnetic Resonance Technology&lt;/em&gt; By Silvia Casini. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2021. Pp. 312. &lt;p&gt;In 1974, a biologist in the biomedical physics laboratory at the University of Aberdeen broke the neck of a mouse to test a newly developed magnetic system. As the system produced data, a physicist began to interpret the data using paints and crayons, creating a colorful coded image of the various tissues of the mouse. This moment would become the predecessor of what is known as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)—the technology used in hospitals and healthcare settings across the globe to see into the human body.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;In &lt;em&gt;Giving Bodies Back to Data&lt;/em&gt;, Silvia Casini provides an enlightening study of how science and the arts engage with data visualization through her &lt;strong&gt;[End Page 705]&lt;/strong&gt; study of MRI technology. She traces the development of MRI technology through the intersecting interests of researchers, clinicians, and physicists at the University of Aberdeen to explore how data visualization is a process that creates a unique space to consider both what is seen and what remains hidden. Perhaps more interesting, Casini continues this study of data visualization as she draws connections between the history of MRI technology and the work of artists and collaborators who transformed this data and clinical knowledge into artistic expressions that truly gave data back to the body.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Casini's book is written for scholars and practitioners interested in art-science collaborations. With this audience in mind, she has divided her book into two sections of three chapters each. In the first section, she draws on various approaches, such as STS knowledge, medical anthropology, and historical epistemology, to examine archival and ethnographic data to study the early development of magnetic imaging technology. For example, Casini uses Mark I, a full-body MRI scanner prototype, as a boundary object that moves between the researchers' benchwork, the clinicians' needs, and underlying artistic application to make the data meaningful. In doing so, she guides the reader through the interests and objects of the many actors contributing to MRI development and its future. Casini then brings this study into the present through her interviews and observations of fast field-cycling MRI research. In this contemporary research setting, she demonstrates how data visualization remains a complicated art-science space as researchers attempt to build a more robust MRI system. This dual examination of the Aberdeen lab nicely echoes the laboratory ethnography of scholars such as Knorr, Traweek, and Latour. Additionally, it provides a well-s","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"43 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140939540","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Il Canale di Suez e l'Italia (1856–1869) [The Suez Canal and Italy (1856–1869)] by Andrea Giuntini (review)","authors":"Simone Fari","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926348","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926348","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt; &lt;span&gt;Reviewed by:&lt;/span&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;li&gt;&lt;!-- html_title --&gt; &lt;em&gt;Il Canale di Suez e l'Italia (1856–1869) [The Suez Canal and Italy (1856–1869)]&lt;/em&gt; by Andrea Giuntini &lt;!-- /html_title --&gt;&lt;/li&gt; &lt;li&gt; Simone Fari (bio) &lt;/li&gt; &lt;/ul&gt; &lt;em&gt;Il Canale di Suez e l'Italia (1856–1869) [The Suez Canal and Italy (1856–1869)]&lt;/em&gt; By Andrea Giuntini. Pisa Ospedaletto: Pacini Editore, 2021. Pp. 174. &lt;p&gt;Andrea Giuntini's &lt;em&gt;Il Canale di Suez e l'Italia&lt;/em&gt; is an insightful and meticulously researched exploration of the Italian experience surrounding the design, construction, and inauguration of the Suez Canal. Giuntini offers a fresh perspective on this historical landmark by delving into a wide array of primary and secondary sources, including articles, books, and travel memoirs written by Italians who were intimately involved in the canal's development. This multifaceted narrative paints a rich and vivid picture of the multifarious roles played by Italians in this monumental project.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;The book seamlessly merges meticulous research with a fluid and accessible writing style, making it an engaging and informative read for both scholars and general readers. Giuntini's adept storytelling techniques bring to life a diverse cast of characters who, while individually modest in their roles, collectively played a pivotal part in the realization of the Suez Canal. From influential political figures to enterprising industrialists and diligent laborers, Giuntini sheds light on the various societal strata that contributed to the canal's development, adding depth and texture to the narrative and reflecting the intricacies of nineteenth-century Italian society.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;The book carefully dissects the aspirations and contributions of Italians from different walks of life, providing a nuanced understanding of their collective engagement. Among the key players were influential politicians who were instrumental in Italy's unification and who saw the Suez Canal as a means to bolster the nation's economic and political stature on the world stage. Concurrently, forward-thinking entrepreneurs recognized the canal's potential to expand their commercial interests, underlining the economic foresight that characterized the Italian engagement in the project.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Notably, Giuntini emphasizes the active role played by Italian trade chambers, which tirelessly advocated for the protection of their members' interests and actively promoted investment in the canal's construction. This &lt;strong&gt;[End Page 729]&lt;/strong&gt; underscores the multidimensional nature of Italian support for the canal, highlighting a determined collective effort to partake in the opportunities presented by this transformative infrastructure.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;The Italian workforce that contributed to the canal's construction was equally diverse and skilled. Experienced engineers, adept at addressing the unique challenges posed by sandy terrains, collaborated with diplomats who actively promoted Italy's prominent role in the proj","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"39 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140926113","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Wissen im Fluss: Der lateinamerikanische Staudammbau im 20. Jahrhundert als globale Wissensgeschichte [Knowledge in flux: Latin American dam construction in the twentieth century as a global history of knowledge] by Frederik Schulze (review)","authors":"Teresa Huhle","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926331","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926331","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt; &lt;span&gt;Reviewed by:&lt;/span&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;li&gt;&lt;!-- html_title --&gt; &lt;em&gt;Wissen im Fluss: Der lateinamerikanische Staudammbau im 20. Jahrhundert als globale Wissensgeschichte [Knowledge in flux: Latin American dam construction in the twentieth century as a global history of knowledge]&lt;/em&gt; by Frederik Schulze &lt;!-- /html_title --&gt;&lt;/li&gt; &lt;li&gt; Teresa Huhle (bio) &lt;/li&gt; &lt;/ul&gt; &lt;em&gt;Wissen im Fluss: Der lateinamerikanische Staudammbau im 20. Jahrhundert als globale Wissensgeschichte [Knowledge in flux: Latin American dam construction in the twentieth century as a global history of knowledge]&lt;/em&gt; By Frederik Schulze. Paderborn: Brill Schöningh, 2022. Pp. 515. &lt;p&gt;The scales of this book match its topic. Frederik Schulze's &lt;em&gt;Wissen im Fluss&lt;/em&gt;, on the planning and construction of large dams in Latin America, is voluminous in pages, extensive in bibliography and sources, broad in its temporal and geographical scope—spanning the whole twentieth century with case studies from Uruguay, Mexico, Venezuela, and Brazil—and profound in its analysis. Thanks to its superb organization, coherent narrative, and masterly contextualization, it also makes for a very good read.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Comprised as a history of knowledge, Frederik Schulze sets out to show the central role of Latin America in the production and application of the technological knowledge that was at play in the state-driven planning and construction of large dams and the infrastructures attached to them. Water engineering, he convincingly argues, was a domain of notable Latin American agency throughout the twentieth century. Engineers and other experts from the area produced, adapted, and exported technological knowledge, while politicians skillfully played foreign firms and investors against each other.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Existing literature on the history of dams, Schulze assesses, has neglected the topics of transfer of knowledge and global interactions. Scholars on Latin America and elsewhere have critiqued dams as \"large projects intoxicated with modernization\" (pp. xxviii–xxix) and have focused on the environmental damage they cause, but Schulze tells us these scholars have neglected the global processes of knowledge production. He vehemently opposes what he refers to as a victimizing perspective on the Global South and presents &lt;strong&gt;[End Page 695]&lt;/strong&gt; convincing arguments and evidence against such approaches. Latin America, for one, created centers of technological knowledge of its own, he shows. The unpredictability of nature, he further illustrates, made it impossible to create stable knowledge on dams, and this precarity opened spaces of contestation for local technicians and politicians.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;His journey starts in Uruguay (Rincón del Bonete Dam, 1904–48), continues to Mexico (Miguel Alemán Dam, 1944–60) and Venezuela (Guri Dam, 1949–86), and ends in Brazil (Tucuruí Dam, 1973–84). Beyond the geographical voyage, the book also moves through development ideas in Latin America's twentieth century. It starts wit","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"2 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140939068","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Dreaming of a Bright Future: Statistics, Disaster, and the Birth of Energopolitics in 1930s Chile","authors":"Mónica Humeres, Magdalena Gil","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926316","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926316","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>abstract:</p><p>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 sociologist Michel Callon's notion of \"interessement\" to describe the strategies of a group of engineers who acted as system builders. Their four main strategies were embracing technological futurisms, forging heterogeneous networks, articulating and mobilizing knowledge, and using crises as windows of opportunity for change. The article shows not only the historical impact of past energy choices on today's world but also that current challenges to energy transitions are not without precedent. Using a sociological framework to tell this story allows us to highlight the mechanisms through which energy systems can change.</p></p>","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"32 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140939147","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"A Ritual Geology: Gold and Subterranean Knowledge in Savanna West Africa by Robyn D'Avignon (review)","authors":"Lorena Campuzano Duque","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926342","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926342","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt; &lt;span&gt;Reviewed by:&lt;/span&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;li&gt;&lt;!-- html_title --&gt; &lt;em&gt;A Ritual Geology: Gold and Subterranean Knowledge in Savanna West Africa&lt;/em&gt; by Robyn D'Avignon &lt;!-- /html_title --&gt;&lt;/li&gt; &lt;li&gt; Lorena Campuzano Duque (bio) &lt;/li&gt; &lt;/ul&gt; &lt;em&gt;A Ritual Geology: Gold and Subterranean Knowledge in Savanna West Africa&lt;/em&gt; By Robyn D'Avignon. Durham: Duke University Press, 2022. Pp. 328. &lt;p&gt;International organizations and most studies analyzing the historical, political, economic, scientific, and technological aspects of gold mining tend to use a dichotomy between industrialized and artisanal mining that regards artisanal mining as exclusively characterized by nonmechanized manual methods, individual work, and limited gold output for subsistence, while industrial mining is recognized as a fully fledged extractive industry. Robyn D'Avignon's &lt;em&gt;A Ritual Geology&lt;/em&gt; challenges this dichotomy through a long-term historical and anthropological study that encompasses the history of gold mining and exploration in West Africa's Birimian Green-stone Belt, which crosses parts of present-day Burkina Faso, Ivory Coast, Mali, Guinea, and southern Senegal, from 800 to the present.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;Drawing on more than 150 interviews, archeological studies, and transnational historical sources, D'Avignon's book is one of the first accounts of how Africans contributed not only their strength but also their brains to the mining industry, joining a new but still inchoate literature that highlights the key role of Africans in the production of agricultural, pastoralist, and botanical knowledge. D'Avignon examines both European geological surveys and African engagement with gold deposits, showing the dialectical relationships between the two, which explains why &lt;em&gt;orpaillage&lt;/em&gt;, the practice of West African alluvial and vein mining, was quintessential to colonial and independent political, industrial, and social life in the Birimian Greenstone Belt. Moving beyond the conventional narrative of capitalist expansion and &lt;strong&gt;[End Page 718]&lt;/strong&gt; labor exploitation, D'Avignon contends that orpaillage developed in conjunction with industrial mining, arguing that African miners in West Africa contributed significantly to the scientific knowledge used by industrial mines. The book successfully shows that rural citizens from French West Africa, who had a deep knowledge of and had been engaged in gold mining for at least the last millennium, played a significant role in the identification of gold deposits and the valorization of minerals for geological missions, first during the colonial period and later, during the Cold War, amid the African decolonization process.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;To make her case, D'Avignon first redefines African engagements with gold mining as a form of ritual geology. She posits that ritual geology comprises \"a set of practices, prohibitions, and cosmological engagements with the earth that are widely shared and cultivated across a regional geological formation\" (p. 5). ","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"2 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"140939155","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"El pensamiento sobre la técnica en México [Thinking about technology in Mexico] ed. by Irving Samadhi Aguilar Rocha and José Francisco Barrón Tovar (review)","authors":"Israel G. Solares","doi":"10.1353/tech.2024.a926328","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1353/tech.2024.a926328","url":null,"abstract":"&lt;p&gt; &lt;span&gt;Reviewed by:&lt;/span&gt; &lt;ul&gt; &lt;li&gt;&lt;!-- html_title --&gt; &lt;em&gt;El pensamiento sobre la técnica en México [Thinking about technology in Mexico]&lt;/em&gt; ed. by Irving Samadhi Aguilar Rocha and José Francisco Barrón Tovar &lt;!-- /html_title --&gt;&lt;/li&gt; &lt;li&gt; Israel G. Solares (bio) &lt;/li&gt; &lt;/ul&gt; &lt;em&gt;El pensamiento sobre la técnica en México [Thinking about technology in Mexico]&lt;/em&gt; Edited by Irving Samadhi Aguilar Rocha and José Francisco Barrón Tovar. Mexico City: Bonilla Artigas Editores/Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos, 2022. Pp. 271. &lt;p&gt;This volume is a collection of contributions to the colloquium \"El pensamiento sobre la técnica en México,\" held in September 2020. It collects the works of the scholars in eleven chapters, with an introduction by the editors and a preface by Javier Oscar Blanco. The chapters are organized chronologically, starting in the sixteenth century and ending in current times.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;As with many books based on conference papers, the topics and methods differ widely, and the chapters vary drastically in extension and overall quality. Chapters 1, 10, 11, and 12 define themselves as philosophical essays on the uses of technology in the Mexican space defined broadly, dealing with baroque machines, tortilla production, and digital technologies in the classroom. Chapters 2 through 9 are analyses of the thinking of José Gaos, Emilio Uranga, José Revueltas, Octavio Paz, Samuel Ramos, Fabián Giménez Gatto, and Naief Yehya. There is no concluding chapter.&lt;/p&gt; &lt;p&gt;The main temporality of the book is the twentieth century, and the strongest contributions are the core chapters focused on Samuel Ramos, Emilio Uranga, and José Revueltas. The chapter by Eloy Caloca Lafont analyzes the thinking of Samuel Ramos in the 1930s and his criticisms of &lt;em&gt;maquinismo&lt;/em&gt;, as a danger of the conquest of the machine over human life but also as part of the expansion of the United States into the world. The chapters by José Francisco Barrón and Irving Samadhi Aguilar uncover the thinking of Emilio Uranga and his reflection on the properties of the machine, between death and life, between the animal and the artificial, and between the given and the produced. These chapters show how a Mexican writer, in the years of the \"Mexican miracle\" (the 1950s), reflected on the aesthetic characteristics of reproduction differently from Walter Benjamin, taking the dead needle of the phonograph as the leading example of reproduction. The contribution by Sergio Lomelí and Tamara Valencia depicts the technological implications of the thinking of communist activist and writer José Revueltas and his comments on the fetishization of technical rationality and how pervasive it was in both the capitalist and the socialist spheres. Along with the pieces on José Gaos and Octavio Paz, these chapters provide an appealing narrative about the thinking on technological knowledge in Mexico and the dialogue and parallels with similar movements around the globe, during the emergenc","PeriodicalId":49446,"journal":{"name":"Technology and Culture","volume":"54 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2024-05-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141152689","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}