The Philadelphia Meeting, 26–29 October 2017
Buy Issue for $25 at JHUP- The Philadelphia Meeting, 26–29 October 2017
The sixtieth annual meeting of the Society for the History of Technology was held at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia from 26 to 29 October 2017. Ling-Fei Lin, William Storey, and Karin Zachmann comprised the program committee. The local arrangements committee included Babak Ashrafi, Ronald Brashear, Mike Geselowitz, Ann N. Greene, Paul Israel, Lawrence Kessler, Scott Knowles, Erik Rau, Ruth Schwartz Cowan, Amy Slaton, Kathy Steen, and Heidi Voskuhl. Additional thanks go to John Krige, Richard Hirsh, Amy Bix, Dave Lucsko, Sonja Beekers, Suzanne Moon, Jane Carlson, Bill Kelsh, Peter and Carol Westin, F. Dean Schultheiss, Matt Henderson, and Fiona Macleod and the staff of the Sheraton Philadelphia Society Hill Hotel.
Annual Meeting Sessions
Engineers and Democracy
Andrew Butrica, Independent Scholar, United States
"Engineers as Politicians and Politicians as Engineers in Twentieth-Century Iran," Sadegh Foghani, University of South Carolina, United States; "Engineers on the Edge: Environmental Regulation and the Challenges of Managing Urban Infrastructure, 1960–2000," Eric Hardy, Loyola University, United States; "Promoting Fresnel in America: The Army Corps of Topographical Engineers and the De-democratization of Science in the Nineteenth-Century United States," James Risk, University of South Carolina, United States; "How to Sell a Neutron Bomb: Captain John Morse and Technopolitical Network-Building, 1958–64," Annie Tomlinson, Cornell University, United States
The Politics of Material Objects
Rachel Maines, Rachel Maines Inc., United States
"The Moral of Morale: Encounters of Weapons, Technologies, and Knowledge in Imperial Frontiers during the Second World War on the India–Burma Borderworlds," Aditya Kiran Kakati, Princeton University, [End Page 410] United States; "How to Make the Future of Fish," Phoebe Sengers, Cornell University, United States; "The Screen and the Apparatus: Synchronization across Media," Ariel Rogers, Northwestern University, United States
Energy in History: Some Thoughts on Causation and Contingency
Jack Brown, University of Virginia, United States
Richard Hirsh, Virginia Tech, United States
Ann Norton Greene, University of Pennsylvania, United States
"Reckoning with Energy to Recast U.S. History," Jack Brown, University of Virginia, United States; "The Original Bridge Fuel: Camphene Lighting in Antebellum America and the Origins of the Oil and Gas Energy Regime," Jeffrey Manuel, Southern Illinois University, United States; "Rhetoric, Reality, and Nuclear Power," David Hecht, Bowdoin University, United States
Welcome and Plenary Session: Technology, Democracy, and Participation
The Local Organizing Committee
Babak Ashrafi, Consortium for History of Science, Technology, and Medicine, Philadelphia, United States
Donna Riley, Virginia Tech, United States; Nathan Ensmenger, Indiana University, United States
Technological Unemployment and the Future of Work: This Time Is Different—Or Is It?
Jonathan Coopersmith, Texas A&M University, United States
Daryl Hafter, Eastern Michigan University, United States
"Diversity and the Future of Work: How Can We Make It Different This Time?" Janet Abbate, Virginia Tech, United States; "The Luddites: From Machine Breakers to Dreamy Romantics," Yakup Bektas, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan; "Do Robots Own the Future? A History-Centered Examination of Technological Unemployment and Economic Uncertainties," Amy Bix, Iowa State University, United States; "This Time Is Not Different: The Politics of Productivity," Louis Hyman, Cornell University, United States; "The Future of Work: Good Jobs for All?" Philip Scranton, Rutgers University, United States; "Men or Robots?" Chris Rasmussen, Fairleigh Dickinson University, United States [End Page 411]
Beyond Borders: Aviation History from a Global View
Jenifer Van Vleck, Smithsonian Institution, United States Chair and Commentator: James Gormly, Washington & Jefferson College, United States
"Cold War Friendly Skies: Pan Am, Aeroflot and the Political Economy of Détente," Steven Harris, University of Mary Washington, United States; "The Global Failure of Supersonic Air Travel: Insight from the Soviet Union," Christopher Zakroff, Georgia Institute of Technology, United States; "A Monroe Doctrine of the Air? The United States and the 1928 Havana Convention," Sean Seyer, University of Kansas, United States
Where Is the Sex in the History of Technology?
Donna Drucker, TU Darmstadt, Germany
Marie Hicks, University of Wisconsin–Madison, United States Commentator: Heather Munro Prescott, Central Connecticut State University, United States
"Form and Reform: Technology and Women's Sexuality in Late Nineteenth-Century American Medicine," Donna Drucker, TU...
