While we read technology news, innovation is the key point in those news. Consumers are engrossed in the latest technology. They might believe that an innovation will change our life rapidly, such as iPhone. However, The Shock of the Old written by David Edgerton tells us a different perspective of realizing, defining and seeing technology.
In this book, David Edgerton refutes the perspective of scientific progression. He believes that we might have a falsely imagine of technology and innovation because of “the innovation-centric account (xi).” Based on this perspective, we wrongly embrace new technology and innovation. The new technology and innovation might not be the most important technology interacting and shaping our life, but old technology is. The old technology is not what we invent, but we live with the old technology.
How does it work? Because we USE it. Edgerton emphasizes the importance of “the use-centred account (xiii).” He indicates that “[o]ur account of significance have been peculiarly innovation-centric, and tied to particular accounts of modernity where particular new technologies were held to be centric (xii).” However, in the perspective of the use-centred account, technologies are not only hard science and technology, but also daily stuff. That is, by revaluing use and taking the perspective of the use-centred account, the definition of technology extends. From nuclear to condom. From the aerospace to the chain saw. Meanwhile, another advantages of the use-centred account “gives us a history of technology engaged with all the world’s population, which is mostly poor, non-white and half female (xiii).” After all, “[i]n use-centred accounts, nearly everywhere does (xiii).” That is, use-centred history not only refutes some well-established conclusions of innovation-centric history but also is extending the traditional history of technology.
Edgerton disputes to extol certain technology. Case study is a writing style that allows him to fall in what he does not want to be. He prefers to take characteristics of technology as the main points. By pinpointing characteristics of technology, he illustrates a plenty of technologies as the examples to portray use-centred history, which is not same with the innovation-centric history. In The Shock of the Old, he takes significance, time, production, maintenance, nations, war, killing and invention as characteristics in order to reveal a non-white-men-centric history. I think this is a new try. Take the characteristics of technology as the cores. Then, find the technologies relating the characteristics to discuss how, when, why, what and who creates, interacts, influence and be influenced. Meanwhile, he does not merely focus on that certain technology, but tracks the history of characteristic of technology and put technologies back to social context. This writing style shows a complex interaction among users, social context, technologies.
The birth-control pill is a good example to indicate the advantage of this writing style. In significance chapter, Edgerton mentions some technologies that we treat them as the significant technologies for changing humans’ life. The birth-control pill changes women’s life and sex because this technology disconnects birth and women. Therefore, women can control their own bodies and enjoy sex. This break-thought technology might have its significance in women’s life and causes a sex revolution. However, Edgerton also mentions condoms to fathom this discussion. Although we probably agree that birth-control pill causes a sex revolution, condoms played a significant role in the past. Before birth-control pill invented, condoms were the most popular birth-control technology. Not only people used them for their pleasure, but also troops used them for the non-sex purpose. Condoms was sold in an amazing number. What a triumph. The advent of birth-control pill stops this triumph. Then, birth-control pill becomes people’s minion. However, could we claim that birth-control pill is the best method of birth-control? In the age of AIDS, this answer is wrong, because using condoms is not only the way of controlling birth but also the method of preventing AIDS. Therefore, this writing style constructs a complicated history of technology. This complicated history of technology will not teach that new is always. It wants to tell us the interwoven relation among society, technologies, and users’ position and users’ decisions. Fairy speaking, this writing style sometimes makes his book choppy. Readers are hard to see the clear connection between two different interwoven relations in the same chapter.
For Edgerton, the most important thing of technology is how technology to be used, not how technology to be invented. Technologies are invented, purchased, chosen, developed and used by humans. By using technology, humans and technology exist. Maybe this statement ignores the autonomy of technology. However, this statement implies humans is subjective, not an objective. Therefore, humans should take responsibility of technology while using it. As for innovation, it is just a simplified term of describing technologies which are developing. Meanwhile, this term falsely implies technology is subjective.
