Sociology - Soc 3106

Class 1

Technology, derived from the Greek tekhne (art, craft, or skill) and logos (word, knowledge, or science): artifact as well as knowledge of those artifacts

Society: a group of people sharing some common features such as political boundaries or citizenship, language, culture, ethnic background, etc.

Technology and society:

- We live in a world of things that people have made

- As human beings, we have relations to the things we have made

- These things are a vital aspect of the human condition

- Technology and society are bound together

The Automobile Age

Impact on cities: tiny towns were no longer being visited as much because many people could drive to the city

Changes in architecture: the stable was first okay to park the car, but as time progressed, there was a breezeway created. Afterwards there was a garages attached to the house.

Changed courtship customs and sexual norms: in 1920's car was used extensively for dating, which undermined the authority of parents. In 30s 40s 50s cops began getting complaints about people stopping at the side of the road and having orgy's. 40% of proposals occurred in a car in the 1960's. Rock and roll refers to having sex in a car and rolling (leaving).

Effects on women's roles in society: car replaced the horse, which meant women were removed from the confinements of their home. Before the car, everything was made by women (clothes, food), but afterwards women became consumers of supermarkets outside their neighborhood. After the refrigerator was invented, shopping became a weekly event.

Class 2

CST offer detailed empirical analyses of the way in which technological development is a contingent, heterogeneous process involving interpretation

Class 3

Wieber Bijker

- Professor of technology and society at the University of Maastricht

- Trained as an engineer in applied physics; holds a PhD in the sociology and history of technology

- Dope smoking critical activist. Involved in editing,

ARTEFACT PRODUCTION INNOVATION ENGINEERING MARKET

Bicycle Workshop Product Mechanical Consumer

Bakelite Early scientific laboratory Process Chemical Industrial

Fluo bulb Large industrial laboratory Product Electrical Consumer and Industrial

Principle of Symmetry

Bloor on science Pinch and Bijker on technology

Impartial to a statement being true or false Impartial to a machine being a success or failure

Symmetrical with respect to explaining truth and falsify Symmetrical with respect to explaining success and failure

Nature is the result, not the cause of a statement becoming a true fact Working is the result, not the cause, of a machine becoming a successful artifact

All forms of knowledge, successful and unsuccessful, all have a component of social causation within them.

Class 3

James J. Flink (1988), The Automobile Age

* Displacement of Existing Technology

* Impacts on Cities

* Impacts on Farm Life and Villages

* Impacts on Architecture

* Impacts on Courtship Customs and Sexual Norms

* Impacts on Women's Roles

Technological Determinism:

* A widespread perspective among many people that is a technology-led theory of society change

* Technology is seen as "the prime-mover" in history

o Social agents and arrangements are seen as secondary

* There are many different definitions of this broad theory

o In economics, for example, it is known as the "technology-pushed" theory

* However, there are three common assumptions:

o Technology as a separate sphere, independent from society

o Following its own internal or autonomous logic (obeying its own laws and principles, beyond any cultural or political influence)

o And then having "impacts" on society

* It also implies there is a single path of evolution and there is no choice but to follow it

Technological "Progress"

* Successive stages of technological development

* Frequently portrayed as revolutions leading to historical eras defined by a particular technology

o The age of machinery, the age of automation, the automobile age, the atomic age, the space age, the electronic age, etc.

* Responsible citizens would accept such changes and adapt to the innovation as seen by technological determinists

Jacques Ellul (1912-1994)

* Pioneer of the sociology of technology

* Pessimistic Determinist

* Technical autonomy reducing the human being to "a slug inserted into a slot machine"

Problems with Technological Determinism

* Intellectually

o Simple cause-and-effect sequence

o Neglects human agency and social arrangements

* Politically

o Uncritical embracing of technological change

o Defensive adaptation to

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