We have never been modern / Bruno Latour ; translated by Catherine Porter.

Main entry:

Latour, Bruno, author.

Title & Author:

We have never been modern / Bruno Latour ; translated by Catherine Porter.

Publication:

Cambridge, Massachusetts : Harvard University Press, 1993.
©1993

Description:

ix, 157 pages : illustrations ; 23 cm

Notes:
Translation of: Nous n'avons jamais été modernes.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 146-153) and index.
Crisis -- Constitution -- Revolution -- Relativism -- Redistribution.
Translated from the French.

Summary:

With the rise of science, moderns believe, the world changed irrevocably separating us forever from our primitive, premodern ancestors. But if we were to let go of this conviction, Bruno Latour asks, what would the world look like? His book, an anthropology of science, shows us how much of modernity is actually a matter of faith. What does it mean to be modern? What difference does the scientific method make? The difference, Latour explains, is in our careful distinctions between nature and society, between human and thing, distinctions that our ancestors, in their world of alchemy, astrology, and phrenology, never made. But alongside this purifying practice that defines modernity, there exists another seemingly contrary one: the construction of systems that mix politics, science, technology, and nature. The ozone debate is such a hybrid, in Latour's analysis, as are global warming, deforestation, even the idea of black holes. As these hybrids proliferate, the prospect of keeping nature and culture in their separate mental chambers becomes overwhelming--and rather than try, Latour suggests, we should rethink our distinctions, rethink the definition and constitution of modernity itself. His book offers a new explanation of science that finally recognizes the connections between nature and culture--and so, between our culture and others, past and present.

Resources:
Table of contents
Table of contents
O'Connell Notes (PDF)
Entire Brian O'Connell Collection

ISBN:

0674948386
9780674948389
0674948394 (pbk.)
9780674948396 (pbk.)

Subject:

Science Social aspects.
Technology Social aspects.
Science Philosophy.
Science History.
Science.
Sociology.
Geschichte
Gesellschaft
Naturwissenschaft
Philosophie
Sciences Aspect social.
Sciences Histoire.
Sciences.
Sociologie.
sciences (philosophy)
sociology.
science (modern discipline)
73.02 philosophy and theory of ethnology.
02.11 sociology of science.
Anthropologie
Moderne
Techniksoziologie
Wissenschaft
Wissenschaftssoziologie
Cultural anthropology.
Sociology of science.
Modernity.

Form/genre:

History

Added entries:

Porter, Catherine, 1941- translator.

Holdings:

Location: Library main 285921
Call No.: BIB 225910
Status: Available

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