Weekly Response Paper

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The primary mode of assessment is 500 word response papers. These papers should show mastery of the weekly reading and develop one thesis or argumentative position on the reading. It needs student to take an argumentative position on the reading, and students position should be expressed clearly in the first paragraph.

There is a "TA example" that is not necessary to have a look, but helpful to know the format.

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Do Artifacts Have Politics? In his article, “Do Artifacts Have Politics?”, Landon Winner presents a compelling argument in support of the idea that artefacts, do indeed, have politics. Published in the journal Daedalus in 1980, Winner puts forward that the politicising of technology, a word which he uses interchangeably with artefact, can occur in one of two ways: by design or by application (p. 134). While the argument is sounds, Winner does a disservice to the discussion of the politicising of technology by focusing exclusively on modern examples. This leads the reader to believe that this is a question which is only relevant in modern times. In effect, this question of assigning a politics to technology is one which dates back millenia. While the plight of tomato farms and the racial implications of overpasses (p. 134) are significant and worthy of discussion, Winner could have strengthened his argument by looking back in time to other technologies which had a much greater impact on civilization. Arguably, one of the single most significant technological advances of the second millenia was the creation of the movable type printing press. This particular technology fits in beautifully with Winner’s example of a technology which was developed with a view of making books faster, it soon became a challenge the early modern European world order. Produced in Germany in the mid 15th century, the movable type printing press changed the world for Europeans and those they would later colonize. Movable type printing presses allowed for the mass production of books, pamphlets, broad sheets, and a plethora of other written material, including the Bible, the first book produced by this particular type of press. This technology, or artefact, put knowledge into the hands of lay people and it is little wonder that Europe soon found itself in the throws of religious upheaval. While Gutenberg may not have intended for the printing press to challenge the world order, it did just that. If one looks to America, a prime example of a technology which was designed with a political end is Eli Whitney’s cotton gin. Designed in the late 18th century, this tool, used in the processing of cotton, was paramount in the Industrial Revolution in the southern United States. The cotton gin greatly reduced the time it took to remove the seeds from the cotton which meant that more clean cotton could be produced in a day. This meant that there was a greater demand for cotton and as it was almost exclusively picked by enslaved people, the cotton gin acted as a tool to perpetuate racially based slavery in America. These examples are but two in the greater narrative of the history of the politicising of technology. The examples provided by Winner are correct and relevant but only to a limited context. Had he explored some of the more well known technologies such as the printing press or the cotton gin, his argument would have demonstrated greater historical relevance and that this is a question is one which is not new at all but rather one which dates back in history. So long as technology is developed, it has the ability to be politicised.
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Hackers: Loving the Machine for Itself
The goddamn contest held at the University of Harvard involves the competition among
engineering students who are believed to be the ugliest in the campus. However, a former student
who is presently a professor in a neighboring university had a different perception about this
notion that he was not too ugly to compete although he was not handsome enough to approach a
beautiful lady at the same time (p.196). As a result, fellow campus mates used to force him into
the competitions of the MIT and some hated him for noticing that he was not as ugly as they
thought. The writer notices that the social disconnection in the cultural beli...


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