Cosmos & hearth : a cosmopolite's viewpoint / / Yi-fu Tuan

• Record Nr.: UNINA9911099564003321
• Autore: Tuan Yi-fu <1930->
• Pubbl/distr/stampa: Minneapolis, : University of Minnesota Press, 1996
• ISBN: 0-8166-8707-2
• Edizione: [1st ed.]
• Descrizione fisica: 1 online resource (216 p.)
• Disciplina: 305.8951073; 973.04951; 973/.04951
• Soggetti: Chinese Americans; Comparative civilization; Internationalism; China Civilization; United States Civilization
• Lingua di pubblicazione: Inglese
• Formato: Materiale a stampa
• Livello bibliografico: Monografia
• Note generali: Includes index.
• Nota di contenuto: CONTENTS; ACKNOWLEDGMENTS; 1 TWO SCALES AND AUTOBIOGRAPHY; 2 CHINA; 3 THE UNITED STATES; 4 A COSMOPOLITE'S VIEWPOINT; NOTES; INDEX
• Sommario/riassunto: In a volume that represents the culmination of his life's work in considering the relationship between culture and landscape, eminent scholar Yi-Fu Tuan argues that "cosmos" and "hearth" are two scales that anchor what it means to be fully and happily human.

British short fiction in the early nineteenth century : the rise of the tale / / Tim Killick

• Record Nr.: UNINA9911099180103321
• Autore: Killick Tim
• Pubbl/distr/stampa: Aldershot, England ; ; Burlington, VT, : Ashgate, c2008
• ISBN: 1-315-57029-7; 1-317-17146-2; 1-317-17145-4; 1-281-79858-4; 9786611798581; 0-7546-8212-9; 9781315570297
• Edizione: [1st ed.]
• Descrizione fisica: 1 online resource (200 p.)
• Disciplina: 823/.0109
• Soggetti: English fiction - 19th century - History and criticism; Literary form - History - 19th century; Short stories, English - History and criticism; Short story
• Lingua di pubblicazione: Inglese
• Formato: Materiale a stampa
• Livello bibliografico: Monografia
• Note generali: Description based upon print version of record.
• Nota di bibliografia: Includes bibliographical references (p. [165]-187) and index.
• Nota di contenuto: Cover; Contents; Acknowledgements; Introduction; 1 Overview: Short Fiction in the Early Nineteenth Century; 2 Washington Irving: Geoffrey Crayon and the Market for Short Fiction; 3 Improving Stories: Women Writers, Morality, and Short Fiction; 4 Regionalism and Folklore: Local Stories and Traditional Forms; Conclusion: Short Fiction in the 1830's; Bibliography; Index
• Sommario/riassunto: Contextualizing British short fiction within the broader context of Romantic-era print culture, Tim Killick argues that authors such as Washington Irving, Mary Russell Mitford, and James Hogg championed the use of short fiction during a period predominantly associated with novel-writing and poetry. His book makes a convincing case for the evolution of short fiction into a self-conscious and modern genre, with its own techniques and imperatives, separate from those of the novel.

The computer boys take over : computers, programmers, and the politics of technical expertise / / Nathan Ensmenger

• Record Nr.: UNINA9911140552603321
• Autore: Ensmenger Nathan <1972->
• Pubbl/distr/stampa: Cambridge, Mass., : MIT Press, ©2010
• ISBN: 0-262-30282-9; 0-262-28935-0
• Edizione: [1st ed.]
• Descrizione fisica: 1 online resource (331 p.)
• Collana: History of computing
• Disciplina: 005.1
• Soggetti: Computer programming; Computer programmers; Software engineering - History; Computer software - Development - Social aspects
• Lingua di pubblicazione: Inglese
• Formato: Materiale a stampa
• Livello bibliografico: Monografia
• Note generali: Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph
• Nota di bibliografia: Includes bibliographical references and index.
• Nota di contenuto: Intro -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Chapter 1. Introduction -- The Computer People -- A Brief History of Programming -- The "Labor Crisis" in Programming -- A Crisis in Programmer Management -- Computing as a Human Activity -- Chapter 2. The Black Art of Programming -- An Unexpected Revolution -- The Origins of Computer Programming -- " Glorifi ed Clerical Workers " -- The Art of Programming -- Building Castles in the Air -- Chapter 3. Chess Players, Music Lovers, and Mathematicians -- In Search of "Clever Fellows" -- The Persistent Personnel Problem -- Wayne State Conference -- Aptitude Tests and Psychological Profi les -- IBM PAT -- Personality Profi les -- The Situation Can Only Get Worse -- Making Programming Masculine -- The Search for Solutions -- Chapter 4. Tower of Babel -- Automatic Programmers -- Assemblers, Compilers, and the Origins of the Subroutine -- FORTRAN -- COBOL -- ALGOL, Pascal, ADA, and Beyond -- No Silver Bullet -- Chapter 5. The Rise of Computer Science -- The Humble Programmer -- Comptologist, Turingeer, or Applied Epistomologist? -- Computer Bureaus and Computing Laboratories -- Trading Zones -- Is Computer Science Science? -- Fundamental Algorithms -- "Cute Programming Tricks" -- ; Science as Professional Identity -- Chapter 6. The Cosa Nostra of the Data Processing Industry -- Unsettling the Desk Set -- Computers Can't Solve Everything -- Seat-of-the-Pants Management -- Management, Information, and Systems -- A New Theocracy-or Industrial Carpetbaggers? -- The Revolt of the Managers -- The Road to Garmisch -- Chapter 7. The Professionalization of Programming -- The Certified Public Programmer -- The Association for Computing Machinery -- The Data Processing Management Association -- Professional Societies or Technician Associations? -- The Limits of Professionalism -- Chapter 8. Engineering a Solution.; Industrializing Software Development -- Aristocracy, Democracy, and Systems Design -- Armies of Programmers -- Superprogrammer to the Rescue -- Computer Programming as a Human Activity -- From Exhilaration to Disillusionment -- Chapter 9. Conclusions -- Software's Chronic Crisis -- Drawing Boundaries/Construction Disciplines -- Visible Technicians -- Where Did All the Women Go? -- From Crisis to Opportunity -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index.
• Sommario/riassunto: "This book provides the most holistic approach to the history of the development of programming and computer systems so far written. By embedding this history in a sociological and political context, Ensmenger has added hugely to our understanding of how the world of computing and its work practices came to be." Martin Campbell-Kelly, Professor of Computer Science, Warwick University.; "The Computer Boys Take Over shows how computer programmers struggled for professional legitimacy and organizational recognition from the early days of ENIAC through the $300 billion Y2K crisis. Ensmenger's descriptions of ̀computer science' and ̀software engineering, ' as well as his portraits of Maurice Wilkes, Alan Turing, John Backus, Edsger Dijkstra, Fred Brooks, and other pioneers, give a compelling introduction to the field." Thomas J. Misa, Director of the Charles Babbage Institute, University of Minnesota.; "The Computer Boys Take Over rewrites the history of computing by recounting the development of software in terms of labor, gender, and professionalization. Ensmenger meets the long-standing challenge to reform computer history by employing themes of vital interest to the general history of science and technology." Ronald Kline, Bovay Professor in History and Ethics of Engineering, Cornell University.; Like all great social and technological developments, the "computer revolution" of the twentieth century didn't just happen. People-not impersonal processes-made it happen. In The Computer Boys Take Over, Nathan Ensmenger describes the emergence of the technical specialists-computer programmers, systems analysts, and data processing managers-who helped transform the electronic digital computer from a scientific curiosity into the most powerful and ubiquitous technology of the modern era. They did so not as inventors from the traditional mold, but as the developers of the "software" (broadly defined to include programs, procedures, and practices) that integrated the novel technology of electronic computing into existing social, political, and technological networks. As mediators between the technical system (the computer) and its social environment (existing structures and practices), these specialists became a focus for opposition to the use of new information technologies. To many of their contemporaries, it seemed the "computer boys" were taking over, not just in the corporate setting, but also in government, politics, and society in general.; Ensmenger follows the rise of the computer boys as they struggled to establish a role for themselves within traditional organizational, professional, and academic hierarchies. He describes the tensions that ; emerged between the craft-centered practices of vocational programmers, the increasingly theoretical agenda of academic computer science, and the desire of corporate managers to control and routinize the process of software development. In doing so, he provides a human perspective on what is too often treated as a purely technological phenomenon. --Book Jacket.