Ruth Schwartz CowanAuthor of several books & articlesHistorian of science, technology and medicine incorporating gender studiesProfessor of History and Sociology of Science at the University of PennsylvaniaHas received many distinguished honors and awards

Ruth Schwartz Cowan

Current research interests are:• The social and ethical implications of all aspects of genetic testing and screening• The social and ethical implications of genetic enhancement• The social and ethical implications of abortion• The history of women engineers and the policy implications of that history for efforts to enhance women’s role in engineering and sciencePast research has been:• The history of housework and of household technologies• The social and ethical implications of new reproductive technologies• The history of technology and its implications for policy• The relationships between gender, science and technology(http://www.ruthcowan.com)

From Virginia Dare to Virginia Slims• Technological change in the cigar-making industry was accelerated by

the availability of female workers – 1869 Cigar-makers’ strike in NYC lead to bringing women into the

industry.– Previously hand-made by men, women used a molding tool– Women were used to working at home. Led to tenement system.

• Advances in technology for the home did not lessen the amount of work women must do at home.– Washing machines - led to doing wash more often.– Some tasks disappeared, such as beating rugs, but were replaced

with waxing linoleum floors.– Many products are more available due to technology, therefore

are not delivered to homes. Instead we must go shopping more often.

More Work for Mother

• Advances in appliance technology have resulted in less help around the house by husbands and children.– Husbands may not help with the dishes because

they have a dishwasher.

• Manufacturing technology moved clothes-making out of the home and into factories.– Women’s roles in the home switched to raising

children, which contributed to the “baby boom”.

CONSUMPTION JUNCTION

• p. 262 "I place the consumer in the center of the network but also to view the network from the consumer's POV."

• “The Consumption Junction: A proposal for Research Strategies in the Sociology of Technology,” in The SocialConstruction of Technological Systems, edited by Wiebe Bijker, Thomas Hughes, and Trevor Pinch (MIT Press, 1987): 261-280. Find this article here: http://faculty.ncf.edu/brain/courses/sustain/library/cowan.pdf

• p. 263 "The consumption junction is the interface where technological diffusion occurs, and it is also the place where technologies began to reorganize social structures"

• p. 273 "The reason for the failure of the stove in the eighteenth century might have had something to do, not with the technical character of the implement, but with its price; only then did I come to realize that what was "better" in technical terms was not necessarily "better" in consumption terms."

CONSUMPTION JUNCTION

• p. 279 "...focusing on the consumer revealed that the diffusion of the stove was dependent not so much on the inventions that altered the form of the stove but rather on innovations that altered the pattern of its production."

CONSUMPTION JUNCTION

Technological Systems• "Consumer-focused analysis also satisfies many of

the criteria of social constructivist sociology. Technological systems that eventually fail are put on an equal footing with those that eventually succeed because, when seen from the perspective of those who were faced with making consumption choices between them in any given historical period, the outcome of the historical process becomes irrelevant to the analysis. Careful attention to the network in which the consumer is embedded necessitates that attention be paid to various social groups who might not have been otherwise considered."