Vol. 39, No. 1, April 2010
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Program Profile, Georgia Institute of Technology
HTS's new home in the Old CE Building, which is equipped with a graduate lounge and kitchen, and individual workstations.
Q: When was your program established and how has it developed since its inception?
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Notes from the Inside
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News
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Member News
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Disturbingly Historical: Reinventing a Museum
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Teaching Tricks
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Program Profile, Georgia Institute of Technology
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Feeding a War: Q & A with Daniel Ragussis
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Honoring Scientists with Stamps
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Searching Smartly in the HistSciTechMed Database
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Jobs, Conferences, Grants
The graduate program in the School of History, Technology and Society was established around the time that Mel Kranzberg retired in the mid-1990s. Kranzberg was a founding father of the Society for the History of Technology. A named chair was created in his honor that was filled first by Bruce Sinclair and then by Phil Scranton. John Krige was recruited to fill the position in 2000, and is currently both the Kranzberg Professor and the Director of Graduate Studies. Since his arrival the Chair has also benefitted from financial support from the B. and B. Stern Foundation which funds travel for the incumbent and a large variety of graduate student activities, including a Kranzberg Graduate Fellow.
The program in 2000 included historians of technology Michael Allen, Gus Giebelhaus, and Steve Usselman and historians of science and technology Ken Knoespel and John Krige. Our senior historian of medicine was Andrea Tone while Mary Frank Fox and Sue Rosser worked in the domain of women, science and technology. Willie Pearson joined the program in 2003 and brought his expertise and national reputation on questions of race, science and technology. Additional sociology strength was provided by Maren Klawiter (sociology of medicine), Amanda Damarin, who works on the social implications of the Internet, and Bill Winders (agricultural policy). Two years ago it was decided to make the graduate program the signature program of the School, and to strengthen the sociology component. In response we recruited three new faculty members: Wenda Bauchspies (science, technology and development), Kristie Macrakis (history of science, German history), and Jenny Smith (environmental history, Russian history). Currently the core teaching staff on the graduate program is Bauchspies, Damarin, Frank Fox, Knoespel, Krige, Macrakis, Smith, Usselman and Winders. Faculty profiles may be accessed at the link below.
What are the comprehensive exam fields?
The program now has separate tracks in history and in sociology of science and technology. It prides itself on being interdisciplinary — indeed most of the faculty in the School are historians. For graduates in the history track a field in the history of science and/or technology is obligatory. So too is a field in one of American, Asian, or European (including Russian) history. Students are free to choose their third field in HTS in line with their dissertation topics. Alternatively they can choose a field offered elsewhere in the Ivan Allen Liberal Arts College — typically in International Affairs or Public Policy.
What are the faculty, program, and resource strengths?
This is, first and foremost, an interdisciplinary program. While our core mission is to train competitive graduates in the history (and sociology) of science and technology, we are emphatic that they be able to contextualize their research in dialogue with other fields in history. We also remain sensitive to the vagaries of the job market. For example, students entering the history track next year will do a mandatory course in Global History. We now have a graduate course in Museum Studies. We encourage students in the masters program to obtain a Certificate in Public Policy (12 credit hours). We have also just joined the ST Global Consortium that will provide opportunities for graduate students to link with their cohort in other schools in the U.S. and abroad, as well as with the AAAS and the National Academies.
We currently have 10 full time and about the same number of part-time students enrolled in the program. Our support for full-time students covers four years. A number of measures have been taken to help them to be competitive for external support at all stages of their academic career. Progress through the program requires meeting milestones intended to ensure that students remain focused on their academic goals. They are encouraged to get involved in research as soon as possible, to give papers at conferences of their professional societies early on, and to apply for external support whenever it is available. Many MS and ABD students also teach as adjuncts either in the Atlanta area or in one of Georgia Tech's many study abroad programs in the summer.
To date our Ph.D. students have found jobs that fitted their interests and exploited their graduate education. Three of them filled postdoc positions, both in the U.S. (at MIT and Yale) and abroad (at Imperial College, London). One of them won the 2008 Patel award for the best Ph.D. on modern India in any U.S. university. Prakash Kumar is an Assistant Professor at Colorado State University while Tim Stoneman is a Visiting Assistant Professor at Clemson University. Yu Tao is an Assistant Professor at Stevens Institute of Technology, and Patrick Zander teaches at Reinhardt College in Atlanta. Other graduates have found employment in academic administration, in museums, and in state, federal and national bodies.
What are some recent dissertations that have been produced by graduate students?
- Prakash Kumar, Facing Competition: The History of Indigo Experiences in Colonial India, 1897-1920
- Chris McGahey, Harnessing Nature's Timekeeper: A History of the Piezoelectric Quartz Crystal Technological Community (1880-1950)
- Jahnavi Phalkey, Big Science, State Formation and Development: The Organisation of Nuclear Research in India, 1938-1959
- Olivia Scriven, The Politics of Particularism: HBCUs, Spelman College, and the Struggle to Educate African Americans in Science, 1950-1997
- Tim Stoneman, Capturing Believers: International Radio, Religion, and Reception, 1931-1970
- Yu Tao, The Earnings of Asian Computer Scientists and Engineers in the U.S.
- Patrick Zander, Right Modern: Technology, Empire, and Britain's Extreme Right Wing in the Fascist Era (1919-1940)
More information on the faculty in the School can be found at www.hts.gatech.edu/faculty/. News on the program and from graduate alumni is available at www.hts.gatech.edu/documents/newsletter_09.pdf. The graduate program is described in more detail at www.hts.gatech.edu/graduate/ where a copy of the handbook is also available.