2025/10/03 by Per Högselius · 1 voice
Arts and Humanities · #Diverse Historical and Scientific Studies #Historical Studies and Socio-cultural Analysis #History of Science and Medicine
paper · doi:10.1093/ahr/rhaf528
openalex publication_date 2025/10/03 · openalex created_date 2025/12/27 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
The notion of the “network society” has been with us ever since a number of social scientists, most famously Manuel Castells, popularized the term in the 1990s. Social science studies of network societies, however, have often been criticized by historians, who have been dissatisfied with the lack of deeper interpretations of how network societies and network cultures emerged and evolved over longer periods of time. From this perspective, German media theorist Sebastian Giessmann’s book The Connectivity of Things: Network Cultures Since 1832 is a very welcome addition to the literature. The book was originally published in German a decade ago, but the English version is more than just a translation, as it includes references to recent events such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Giessmann, who identifies himself as an “East German dissertation writer,” compares a variety of network cultures and examines how they have taken shape over the centuries. The book astonishingly weaves together seemingly disparate human activities in science, technology, economics, and culture that at first glance may appear incompatible, but on closer inspection turn out to be related.