In this address to the president's plenary at the 2001 annual meeting of the Society for Social Studies of Science in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the author reflected on then recent international events and their possible implications for the research and teaching agendas of the social studies of science, technology, and medicine. He proposed the political engagement of science, technology, and society institutions and individual STS researchers while maintaining a strong commitment to the scholarly studies of science and technology. Drawing on the (...) work of René Gabriëls, the author elaborated a role for STS scholars as the new generation of “public intellectuals.”. (shrink)

THE SIXTEENTH INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS of the History of Science is scheduled to assemble in Bucharest, Rumania, in August 1981. To mark that occasion Isis is pleased to publish two essays on Marxism and the history of science.

This book examines the rise of cultural studies and evaluates its strengths and weaknesses. The author raises searching questions about the originality of cultural studies and its political motivation. Written with zest and a judicious sense of purpose it is a landmark work in cultural studies media and the sociology of culture.

The most remarkable aspect of Einstein’s 1946 address at Lincoln University is that it has vanished from Einstein’s recorded history. Its disappearance into a historical black hole symbolizes what seems to happen in the creation of a cultural icon. It is but one of many political statements by Einstein to have met such a fate, though his civil rights activism is most glaringly missing. One explanation for this historical amnesia is that those who shape our official memories felt that Einstein’s (...) “controversial” friends like Paul Robeson and activities like co‐chairing the anti‐lynching crusade might tarnish Einstein as an icon. That icon, sanctified by Time magazine when it dubbed Einstein “Person of the Century” at the end of 1999, is a myth, albeit a marvelous one. Yet it is not so much the motive for the omission but the consequence of it that should concern us. Americans and the millions of Einstein fans around the world are left unaware that he was an outspoken, passionate, committed antiracist. (shrink)