A simple case for cultural studies of technologies
Technologies do not exist in a vacuum. There is no ideal type for a hammer. Instead, there are rubber mallets, ball-peen hammers, “standard” hammers, sledge hammers, and war hammers. All of these embody their specific uses. It’s true that any one might be use for unintended purposes but the very fact that we can say someone is using the “wrong” hammer or using a hammer for something unintended shows the non-neutrality of the hammer. In social reality, tools do not exist without the meanings associated with them.
