Technological Change: Methods and Themes in the History of Technology (Routledge Studies in the History of Science, Technology and Medicine)

In this volume, scholars from these two very different traditions are brought together. Never before has a single volume contained such a distinguished and diverse group of historians of technology. Cover Title Copyright Page Contents Preface Introduction: Methods and thelnes in the history of technology Models 1. The social construction of technology: a review 2. Towards a history of technological thought 3. Bodies, fields, and factories: technologies and understandings in the age of revolutions 4. Evolution and technological change: a new metaphor for economic history? Medieval Technology and Social Change 5. Lynn White's Medieval Technology and Social Change after thirty years 6. Medieval technology and the historians: the evidence for the mill Rethinking the Industrial Revolution 7. Law, espionage, and the transfer of technology from eighteenth century Britain 8. Concepts of invention and the patent controversy in Victorian Britain 9. Technological change during the first industrial revolution: the paradigm case of textiles, 1688–1851 Technology, Politics, and National Cultures 10. Technology transfer and industrial transformation:an interpretation of the pattern of economic development circa 1870–1914 11. The Japan that can say No: the rise of techno-nationalism and its impact on technological change 12. Politics and the passion for production: France and the USSR in the 1930s 13. Managing complexity: interdisciplinary advisory committees 14. How do we know the properties of artefacts? Applying the sociology of knowledge to technology Index The social construction of technology : a review / Trevor Pinch Towards a history of technological thought / Antoine Picon Bodies, fields, and factories : technologies and understandings in the age of revolutions / John V. Pickstone Evolution and technological change : a new metaphor for economic history? / Joel Mokyr Lynn White's Medieval technology and social change after thirty years / Bert Hall Medieval technology and the historians : the evidence for the mill / Richard Holt Law, espionage, and the transfer of technology from eighteenth century Britain / John Harris Concepts of invention and the patent controversy in Victorian Britain / Christine MacLeod Technological change during the first industrial revolution : the paradigm case of textiles, 1688-1851 / Patrick O'Brien, Trevor Griffiths, and Philip Hunt Technology transfer and industrial transformation : an interpretation of the pattern of economic development circa 1870-1914 / Ian Inkster The Japan that can say no : the rise of techno-nationalism and its impact on technological change / Morris F. Low Politics and the passion for production : France and the USSR in the 1930s / Yves Cohen Managing complexity : interdisciplinary advisory committees / Thomas P. Hughes How do we know the properties of artefacts? applying the sociology of knowledge to technology / Donald MacKenzie. Technological Change gathers together examples of the best current thinking on methodology and the theoretical perspectives that are increasingly of concern to historians of technology, whilst at the same time presenting other papers which reflect the 'state of the art' in key areas of historical debate. The volume emphasises the need both to establish a common forum for theoretical and empirical research and also to delineate the shared concerns of these two treatments, which are too often reflected as conflicting rather than mutually supportive approaches to the writing of the history of technology. In the last decade "the social construction of technology" has become much in vogue.