Overview

Abstract

What do historians have to say about the future when they look at the past? Can we make a U-turn to the Future by way of the Past?

From local bike-sharing initiatives to overhauls of transport infrastructure, mobility is one of the most important areas in which modern cities are trying to realize a more sustainable future. Covid-19 has turned into a giant and global experiment about what that future could look like. Yet even as the present seems to offer a tantalizing thought experiment and as politicians and planners look ahead, there remain critical insights to be gleaned from the history of urban mobility and the unsustainable practices that still impact our everyday lives. Taking a leaf from the notion of the “usable past,” Oldenziel presents case studies of the book by the same title that consider the ecological, social, and economic aspects of urban mobility, showing how historical inquiry can make both conceptual and practical contributions to the projects of sustainability and urban renewal.

As Editor in Chief of Technology and Culture, she is also available for Q&A about the journal.

About the Speaker

Ruth Oldenziel, Professor at Eindhoven University of Technology, is Editor in Chief of Technology and Culture (2020 – 2025), received her PhD in American History at Yale University after graduate training at Smith College, the University of Massachusetts, and the University of Amsterdam. Her publications include books, anthologies, and articles in the area of American, gender, and technology studies: “The Sociotechnical Roots of Smart Mobility” (2020); A U-Turn to the Future (2020); Engineering the Future; Understanding the Past (2017); Cycling Cities series (2016-present); Consumers, Tinkerers, Rebels (2013); Cycling and Recycling (2015); Hacking Europe (2014); “Islands: The Networked Empire of the U.S.” (2011); Cold-War Kitchen (2009); “Theorizing the Mediation Junction” (2009) Gender and Technology (2003); Crossing Boundaries, Building Bridges (2000); Making Technology Masculine (1999); “Boys and their Toys in America” (1997).

Organizer

CRF Project “Making Modernity in East Asia: Technologies of Everyday Life, 19th – 21st Centuries” (RGC CRF HKU C7011-16G), Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences, The University of Hong Kong