Introduces students to basic interpretive issues, bibliographic sources, and professional standards.
Topics change from year to year.
Introduction to the consideration of technology as the outcome of particular technical, historical, cultural, and political efforts, especially in the United States during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Aims at understanding the different questions and methods social scientists have posed and used in exploring how social context and norms influence the work of scientists and engineers. Students read studies of science labs, science policy, Internet culture, and science in popular culture. Use of cases and recent literature. Introduction to the history and current controversies in environmental studies.