Public history

Undisciplined Histories of Maintenance

4 July 2022

Hands on History talk with Andrew Russell, Dean, College of Arts & Sciences, SUNY Polytechnic Institute.

When Lee Vinsel and I started The Maintainers and wrote “The Innovation Delusion,” we brought our historical sensibilities to a project that we hoped would reach broader and more general audiences. In the process, we set aside some of the conventions of archive-based history and embraced approaches from different academic and non-academic fields. In this talk I’ll describe some of our choices, and how it led to some unexpected scholarly insights—and moments of joy.

 

Andrew Russel

 

Andrew Russell is a co-founder of The Maintainers with Lee Vinsel, in 2016. As a co-director, he works with Lee, Jessica, and Lauren on research projects, outreach, and a variety of organizational work that goes into maintaining the Maintainers. His background is in the history of technology, where he writes and teaches about subjects such as Internet history, technical standards, and technology in American life. He really enjoys seeing connections and patterns between maintenance in our personal lives and maintenance on broader scales, such as in organizations or state or national governments.

 

Monday, 4 July 2022

14.00 - 15.00

Hybrid event: C²DH Open Space and Webex

If you want to participate, just come to the 4th floor of the MSH or contact vanessa.napolitano@uni.lu for the Webex link.