Tools, Totems, and Totalities

This book provides a critical perspective on technology, answering the questions of why technologies often disappoint. It takes a sociotechnical and historical perspective on technology, as developed by an engineer–anthropologist and a design anthropologist, to answer questions not only about why modern societies have great expectations of technology, but also of why these technologies often fail to meet expectations. Modern societies often search for technological solutions (“technofixes”) to what are institutional problems, which include border crossings or urban mobility, or improvements in productivity or improved communication. It is disappointing when technofixes, whether border walls or driverless cars or social media, fail to live up to their promises of greater personal autonomy (such as afforded by driverless cars) or improved social harmony through social media. Examining technology from the perspectives of instrumentality (“tools”), identity (“totems”), and world-defining systems (“totalities”) develops a comprehensive perspective that is at once historically informed and cross-culturally accurate. Although instrumentality is obvious and is at the core of any understanding of technology, identity is less so; yet many modern “tribes” create their identity in terms of technological objects and systems, whether transport systems (cars and airplanes) or social media or weapons (guns). Further, modern technologies span the globe, so that they exert imperative coordination over distant populations; the use of cell phones around the world is testimony to this fact. Such a critical perspective on technology can be useful in policy discussions of numerous issues affecting contemporary institutions.