Product Description

From the author of Why Things Bite Back– which introduced us to the revenge antics of technology–Our Own Devices is a wonderfully revealing look at the inventions of everyday things that protect us, position us, or enhance our performance.

In helping and hurting us, these body technologies have produced consequences that their makers never intended:
• In postwar Japan traditional sandals gave way to Western-style shoes because they were considered marks of a higher standard of living, but they seriously increased the rate of fungal foot ailments.
• Reclining chairs, originally promoted for healthful brief relaxation, became symbols of the sedentary life and obesity.
• A keyboard that made the piano easier to learn failed in the marketplace mainly because professional pianists believed difficult passages needed to stay difficult.
• Helmets, reintroduced during the carnage of World War I, saved the lives of countless civilian miners, construction workers, and, more recently, bicyclists.

Once we step on the treadmill of progress, it’s hard to step off. Yet Edward Tenner shows that human ingenuity can be applied in self-preservation as well, and he sheds light on the ways in which the users of commonplace technology surprise designers and engineers, as when early typists developed the touch method still employed on today’s keyboards. And he offers concrete advice for reaping benefits from the devices that we no longer seem able to live without. Although dependent on these objects, we can also use them to liberate ourselves. This delightful and instructive history of invention shows why National Public Radio dubbed Tenner “the philosopher of everyday technology.”

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #641752 in Books
• Published on: 2003-06-03
• Released on: 2003-06-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 336 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Marshall McLuhan once described media as an extension of the central nervous system. Tenner, a Princeton scholar and author (Why Things Bite Back), whose work might best be described as an anthropological history of science, extends the metaphor to even the simplest technologies-any "human modification of the natural world," as he puts it-and examines the impact that technology has had on human technique: the routine ways in which people perform everyday tasks. In-depth chapters track key moments in the development of baby bottles, sandals, athletic shoes, chairs for home and office, music keyboards, typing keyboards, eyeglasses and helmets. If you've ever wondered how QWERTY became the standard layout for typewriters and computer keyboards, or how touch typing became formalized, this is the book for you. It's especially effective in identifying the ways technology shapes the human body; the footwear different societies favor, for example, affects people's stride, while regular use of rubber bottle nipples causes infants to forget how to use their jaws and tongues to breastfeed. The latter is an excellent example of one of the book's persistent themes, the "machine for producing dependency on itself," changing our lives so radically that it becomes difficult, if not impossible, to go back to the way things used to be. (Consider the discomfort Westerners accustomed to a lifetime in chairs experience when they try to sit lotus-style.) Tenner's erudite yet approachable style and his way with telling details keep his potentially obscure subject from becoming dry and boring, and those in search of a quirky but cerebral read will be delighted.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal
Adult/High School-From the effect of shoes, and the reasons for wearing them, to the design of keyboards, Tenner traces the interaction between the human body and technology, and how the tools we make change and affect us. The first chapter provides numerous examples in brief, from speed skates to Glock pistols. After that, the author gets into cases, devoting one chapter, for instance, to thong sandals, or zoris, in different cultures, and another to the faddishly popular athletic shoe. Surprisingly, for a work that covers such a broad topic, this book is a page-turner, largely due to its clear prose and the author's approach to the material. While not lavishly illustrated, there seems to be a picture every time one is needed to illustrate the technology being discussed. There is a good annotated list of books for suggested reading at the end.
Paul Brink, Fairfax County Public Library, VA
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Tenner, author of Why Things Bite Back (1996), offers a fascinating look at how devices we have created have affected our development. He looks at everyday objects (reclining chairs, thong sandals, running shoes, eyeglasses, musical keyboards, and the typewriter) and explores how they were created, how they have developed, and the often unintended ways they have influenced us, including how we sit, stand, walk, and communicate. Technological advancements have enhanced our comfort and expanded our capabilities, but they have also prompted increased dependence and changed the way we evolve physically. For example, the invention of the typewriter has increased reading material and facilitated public education but weakened eyesight (a problem addressed through the technology of eyeglasses). Tenner's lively writing style (as well as the illustrations of early designs) and appreciation of the politics and economics that accompany scientific developments help put everyday technology in perspective. Tenner concludes with a chapter on trends and what we can expect as we learn new body skills, ever-adapting techniques to match the technology. Vanessa Bush
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