At 01:20 PM 4/1/98 -0500, you wrote:
>Yeah, this IS great stuff.  I love the transcription errors:
>machine-translation/speech-recognition howlers like "Thostine Beblin".
>I DO wish somebody at W&L was inspired to teach a History of Technology
>course.
>
>Hugh Blackmer      hblackme@wlu.edu    or    blackmer.h@wlu.edu
>

From blackburnj@wlu.edu Wed Apr  1 16:02:32 1998
Date: Wed, 01 Apr 1998 13:35:08 -0500
Subject: Re: Leo Marx

Hugh:

History of Technology: If you'll teach it, I'll audit it. 

Actually, I would love to help teach something like that-- I've been
thinking a great deal about this pastoral/technological thing that Marx
does such a good job dealing with in literature. This hypothetical course
would tackle the two biggest ideas in American cultural history--
technology and frontier (democracy takes a back seat for the sake of this
argument)-- with material drawn from art (have you seen Marx's book on
American painting and the railroads?-- it's  excellent), literature,
history, politics, and journalism. Maybe team-taught with one instructor as
the technology guy and the other as the frontier guy. 

I hear folks in California walk around with unsold screenplays in their
coats; I daydream course syllibi. 

John

From hblackme@liberty.uc.wlu.edu Wed Apr  1 16:03:12 1998
Date: Wed, 1 Apr 1998 13:38:55 -0500 (EST)
From: "Hugh A. Blackmer" 
To: John Blackburn 
Subject: Re: Leo Marx

Not such a bad idea.  The way to actually DO it would probably be as a
University Scholars course.  We may want to think about this a bunch
more... In fact in my former life I _did_ teach a lot of H of T in
anthropology courses, and it's a subject I've been gathering stuff about
for more than 30 years....

Hugh Blackmer      hblackme@wlu.edu    or    blackmer.h@wlu.edu


From blackburnj@wlu.edu Wed Apr  1 16:02:42 1998
Date: Wed, 01 Apr 1998 15:45:22 -0500
From: John Blackburn 
To: "Hugh A. Blackmer" 
Subject: Re: Leo Marx

Hmmm...that sounds very interesting. Let me gather together what materials
I have for this Dream Course, and we'll talk about it. I'm kind of excited
about the thought of constructing the course in such a way that two
different instructors could represent and speak to these two huge,
competing ideas-- technology/industrialization (MACHINE) and the American
notion of the sublime virgin land, just over the western horizon (IN THE
GARDEN). Now THAT woudl be a cool course. 

John

At 03:57 PM 4/1/98 -0500, you wrote:
>One of the things I've thought about while moving books and journals: we
>have a pretty remarkable collection of out of date books and periodicals
>which document and reflect the last century+ of American technological
>development --including such obvious sources as Science and SciAm, but
>also books on railroads, mining, industrial engineering, etc. etc.  These
>are potentially PRIMARY data for the study/unpacking/reappreciation of a
>century-long PROCESS of evolution/accomodation. I'd love to see them get
>used for something more than resting place for dust motes, something
>creative and exploratory.
>
>I sense a weblet brewing, and suspect it'll be /~hblackme/technol/
>
>Hugh Blackmer      hblackme@wlu.edu    or    blackmer.h@wlu.edu
>

From blackburnj@wlu.edu Wed Apr  1 16:03:45 1998
Date: Wed, 01 Apr 1998 16:04:09 -0500
From: John Blackburn 
To: "Hugh A. Blackmer" 
Subject: Re: Leo Marx

That's good stuff.

And there's nothing more instructive than an out-of-date book when it comes
ot technology. To read what was written about, say, TV in the early days is
fascinating. The rhetoric follows a consistent pattern in America, but you
see it only when you look back.

I wrote something about techno-rhetoric a while back:
http://www.people.virginia.edu/~jab3w/w2.html

The first two articles, "Great Expectations..." are the ones. 


John

Date: Thu, 2 Apr 1998 08:47:02 -0500 (EST)
From: "Hugh A. Blackmer" 
To: blackburnj@liberty.uc.wlu.edu
Subject: technol continued

While riding home yesterday I thought of a title and some of the plumbing:

Technology and American Frontiers: an exploration of resources

--choose one or more of the following: a technology, a decade, a frontier
[literal-spatial or metaphorical], a region, an author, an industry (etc.)

--use W&L library resources as the primary basis for constructing a web
exposition of the subject

(I think of things like: photography, journalism, meat packing, settling
the plains, the end of the steam era, infectious disease, recorded
music... )

Date: Thu, 02 Apr 1998 11:24:59 -0500
From: John Blackburn 
To: "Hugh A. Blackmer" 
Subject: Re: technol continued

Yes, yes, yes! Along with readings in Jefferson, Franklin, Crevecoeur,
Lewis & Clark Journals, (Leo) Marx, Henry Nash Smith, Frederick Jackson
Turner, Whitman, Emerson, Thoreau,  Twain, Zane Grey, Eco, Jonathon Raban,
Teddy Roosevelt, and Sam Shepard. American painting and photography
survey...a class on the media and advertising images of technology and th
West (from early ads aimed at European potential immigrants to current
sport utility vehicle ad campaigns)...a class on transportation technology
(Lewis' longboat to the train to the SUV)...a class on communications
technology. (Man alive, this is a big course!)

Aternate title: Lighting Out for the Territories: Technological Progress 
and the American Landscape