'An Extremely Useful Invention': Edison's electric pen and the unravelling of old and new media. (August 2019)
- Record Type:
- Journal Article
- Title:
- 'An Extremely Useful Invention': Edison's electric pen and the unravelling of old and new media. (August 2019)
- Main Title:
- 'An Extremely Useful Invention': Edison's electric pen and the unravelling of old and new media
- Authors:
- Unwin, Peter
- Other Names:
- Natale Simone guest-editor.
Lesage Frederik guest-editor. - Abstract:
- Using Edison's electric pen as a case study, this article examines the role of media narratives in determining the ways in which a new medium is finally judged a success or failure. By challenging the narrative of the electric pen as a failed technology, it maintains that oppositional criteria such as new/old, winner/loser and successful/obsolete are counterproductive to a meaningful understanding of technical media. Instead, this article seeks to reposition and reappraise the electric pen, not as a study in failure and obsolescence, but as a site for the implementation of powerful cultural narratives that helped to define individuality and human agency in the beginnings of the modern age.
- Is Part Of:
- Convergence. Volume 25:Number 4(2019)
- Journal:
- Convergence
- Issue:
- Volume 25:Number 4(2019)
- Issue Display:
- Volume 25, Issue 4 (2019)
- Year:
- 2019
- Volume:
- 25
- Issue:
- 4
- Issue Sort Value:
- 2019-0025-0004-0000
- Page Start:
- 607
- Page End:
- 626
- Publication Date:
- 2019-08
- Subjects:
- Biographies of media -- duplication -- Edison -- electric pen -- electrification -- handheld devices -- machinic ecologies -- media narratives -- obsolescence -- old and new media -- predigital media
Mass media -- Technological innovations -- Periodicals
Telecommunication -- Periodicals
Mass media and technology -- Periodicals
621.3897 - Journal URLs:
- http://con.sagepub.com/ ↗
http://www.uk.sagepub.com/home.nav ↗ - DOI:
- 10.1177/1354856519846790 ↗
- Languages:
- English
- ISSNs:
- 1354-8565
- Deposit Type:
- Legaldeposit
- View Content:
- Available online (eLD content is only available in our Reading Rooms) ↗
- Physical Locations:
- British Library DSC - BLDSS-3PM
British Library HMNTS - ELD Digital store - Ingest File:
- 10905.xml