Professor Taranovski in the History Department will be offering a new course in fall in the Science, Technology and Society program. It looks very interesting for PG majors in particular. Details below.
STS 322, War, Technology, and Society in the Modern World
Prof. T. Taranovski
The course will be not so much interdisciplinary as integral and integrative in scope and character. It takes as its point of departure the observation that what has been called “the Western way of war” has become global in character over the past couple of centuries and that it has shaped the way we live and, in turn, has been shaped by scientific, technological, and socio-economic developments on a global scale. In order to understand the full ramifications of this phenomenon, we need to approach it integrally through an analysis of history of international relations, modern political systems, social, economic, and demographic developments, and advances in scientific and technological innovation that are often neglected in discussion of how contemporary world functions. This is why I am proposing the course under the rubric of the STS program rather than as a regular departmental offering, especially since STS is the only academic program that provides place for discussion of technology as a subject matter.
The course will be organized chronologically and topically to cover the period from the 16th to the 21st century. It will emphasize the continuity and integrality of historical developments as well as the dramatic change that can occur as a result of scientific and technological innovation by focusing on warfare as a case-study of where such nexus is most readily and forcefully apparent. The course will strive to demonstrate that the history of the modern world since the beginning of the modern era, particularly in the West, has been characterized by an exponential increase in the scope and lethality of warfare, by growing involvement and participation of humanity as a whole in the conduct of war and exposure to its consequences, and by expanding integration and coordination of political and military activity with scientific and industrial aspects of modern society.
