Historiography of Science and Technology: Social Turns, Gender, and the Science-Technology Relationship

The 1970s and 1980s witnessed a profound transformation in the historiography of science and technology, driven by broader social and intellectual movements. Ecology, feminism, multiculturalism, and postmodernism redirected scholarly perspectives, extending the critical attitudes of prior decades. Alongside the rise of Sociology of Scientific Knowledge (SSK) and actor-network theory, historians expanded their purview to include gender, race, colonialism, and environmental studies. This shift directly reflected the growing social criticism of scientific and industrial enterprises during that period.

A pioneering figure in this expansion was Carolyn Merchant. She identified three key domains for gender studies: ideology, metaphor, and social role. Her seminal work, "The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology and the Scientific Revolution" (1980), fit the first domain. While traditional in its account of the Scientific Revolution, her analysis was radical in its gendered explanation. Merchant linked the geometrization and mechanization of nature—core themes for earlier historians like Alexandre Koyré and Charles Gillispie—to the rise of exploitative capitalism and the social subordination of women.

Merchant’s other domains were subsequently explored by other scholars. The study of gendered images and metaphors was advanced by Thomas Laqueur and Londa Schiebinger. Meanwhile, Margaret Rossiter comprehensively documented the social roles and professional challenges faced by women in science. Studies on science and race, though less sustained, were notably influenced by Stephen Jay Gould’s "The Mismeasure of Man" (1981), which critiqued intelligence science as being conditioned by unconscious social and racial prejudices.

The history of colonial science emerged in the context of post-WWII decolonization. An early model was the diffusionist model proposed by George Basalla, which depicted a linear transfer of European science to colonies. By the 1980s, this view was challenged. Colonial scientific enterprises came to be seen as complex, interactive systems used as much for control as for enlightenment. This postcolonial critique redefined the field, emphasizing bidirectional influence and power dynamics.

The history of technology also diversified, engaging with new currents while debating constructivism versus traditionalism. Lewis Mumford’s evolutionary theories were refined by scholars like George Basalla and economic historian Joel Mokyr. The influence of business history, sparked by Alfred D. Chandler’s "The Visible Hand" (1977), and labour history enriched the field. Ruth Schwartz Cowan, in "More Work for Mother" (1983), demonstrated the explanatory power of gender analysis for household technology. Despite critiques, technological determinism remained a potent concept, and the field fragmented into numerous specialty subfields.

The Science-Technology Relationship. The relationship between science and technology has been a central concern for historians of technology. A 1985 review of Technology and Culture by John Staudenmaier found it to be the journal's single most popular issue. Most historians of science traditionally viewed technology as applied science, emphasizing its role in instrumentation. Historians of technology found this linear model demeaning and inaccurate. Edwin Layton’s 1971 "Mirror-Image Twins" challenged it, portraying 19th-century science and engineering as symmetrical yet opposite in their value hierarchies: theory versus practice.

These differing views fueled the formation of the Society for the History of Technology (SHOT). Attempts to find common ground were largely unsuccessful until the constructivist turn. This shift encouraged both communities to consider contextual forces like politics, economics, and culture, revealing commonalities between laboratory and shop-floor practice. The European concept of technoscience, promoted by Bruno Latour, further reduced the polarity between the two fields.

By the late 20th century, science and technology became increasingly intertwined. Scientific fields like particle physics and astrophysics grew dependent on complex technological instruments. Concurrently, high technology became more science-based, a trend formalized since the 18th century with the creation of engineering schools. This interdependence led historians to revisit earlier eras, discovering instances where technological invention preceded scientific discovery, such as Galileo’s use of the telescope.

Two analyses of the Industrial Revolution highlight the field’s transformation. In Science and Technology in the Industrial Revolution (1969), A. E. Musson and Eric Robinson argued against purely craft-based explanations. They found a complex, interactive relationship between knowledge production and industry, anticipating social constructivist insights. Margaret C. Jacob, in The Cultural Meaning of the Scientific Revolution (1988), focused on indirect cultural linkages, arguing that a new culture of curiosity and improvement fueled industrialization.

In 2007, Paul Forman presented an iconoclastic argument in "The Primacy of Science in Modernity, of Technology in Postmodernity...". He asserted a seismic shift around 1980, where technology supplanted science as the dominant cultural force in public consciousness—a shift he claimed historians of technology missed. Forman criticized SHOT for being blinded by an ideology that dismissed science and embraced the autonomy of technological knowledge, thus ignoring the rise of technological determinism in postmodernity.

Conclusion. Forman’s thesis highlighted the lack of consensus in both historiographies at the dawn of the 21st century. While his erudition was acknowledged, his proposed paradigm shift was not widely accepted. The history of science, enriched by diverse perspectives, struggled with a loss of coherent master narratives, exemplified by the deconstruction of the Scientific Revolution as a unified concept. Similarly, the history of technology resisted synthesis. Robert Friedel’s A Culture of Improvement (2007) proposed a unifying theme of a cultural predisposition for "improvement," but it was unlikely to establish a new dominant trajectory. Both fields appeared to eschew grand narratives in favor of a rich, multifaceted dialogue of voices and methodologies.