Historical Studies Program and Dean of the College Present
“Think Different”: The Silicon Valley and the Grassroots Transformation of Work and Democracy in the 20th Century
Friday, February 8, 2019
Olin Humanities, Room 102
2:00 pm – 3:30 pm EST/GMT-5
2:00 pm – 3:30 pm EST/GMT-5
Jeannette Alden Estruth
Postdoctoral Visiting Scholar
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The Harvard University Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society
The late 20th century saw the meteoric rise of the high-technology industry in the United States. Synonymous with this growth was the region that came to be known as California’s Silicon Valley. The Silicon Valley, however, did not just represent a place or an industry. It also encompassed a new set of ideas about American prosperity and the country’s future. Jeannette Estruth’s research traces the genesis of these ideas, and finds them in the early community movements that fought the material challenges presented by the technology industry’s rapid economic expansion. She shows that the industry’s encounters with dissenting voices produced new visions about what work meant, how economies functioned, and what democracy should look like. In doing so, Estruth argues that the local technology sector revolutionized American political thought in the late 20th century, creating a new economic era by the turn of the 21st.Postdoctoral Visiting Scholar
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The Harvard University Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society
For more information, call 845-758-7395, or e-mail [email protected].
Time: 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm EST/GMT-5
Location: Olin Humanities, Room 102