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The Routledge Handbook of Information History
Author(s): Toni Weller (Editor), Alistair Black (Editor), Bonnie Mak (Editor), Laura Skouvig (Editor)
- Publisher: Routledge
- Publication Date: 2 July 2025
- Edition: 1st
- Language: English
- Print length: 616 pages
- ISBN-10: 1032316071
- ISBN-13: 9781032316079
Book Description
The Routledge Handbook of Information History offers a definitive, inclusive, and far-reaching study of how information practices have influenced―and have been influenced by―society, politics, culture, and technology over millennia.
Information is often considered a defining characteristic of modern society, but it is far from a modern phenomenon. In the last decades, historians have started to ask new questions about how information was understood in the past, suggesting that it has a history which is long, complex, and multifaceted. This influential volume is the first large-scale collection to use the term Information History as its titular focus, situating "information" within the historiography of the field. The book showcases a diverse assembly of over forty international contributors who explore information practices from antiquity to the contemporary world, with geographical coverage ranging across Europe, Africa, Asia, as well as North and South America.
Including overview chapters alongside a wide range of in-depth empirical studies, this ground-breaking collection will appeal to scholars and students across the arts, humanities, and social sciences, offering readers unique insights into how historical practices have influenced the understanding and role of information in our modern world.
Chapters 1 and 37 of this book are freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY-NC) 4.0 license.
Chapters 28 and 34 of this book are freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license.
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Review
“Information always has a modern ring to it, but as we enter the AI revolution, we would do well to remember that many of the basic challenges we face today have roots that lead back to antiquity. This essential book shows just how deeply the origins of the modern information revolution are rooted in the past.”
Jacob Soll, University Professor and Professor of Philosophy, History, and Accounting, University of Southern California, USA
“This is a refreshingly broad compilation, one which offers a provocative look across information-related practices, delving into cultural and historical specificities as a way to ensure that information history emerges at large as a vital area of study.”
Lisa Gitelman, Professor of English and Media, Culture, and Communication, New York University, USA
About the Author
Toni Weller is visiting research fellow in history at De Montfort University, UK. For the past twenty years she has authored numerous books, articles, and book chapters on the theory of information history, women and information, Victorian information culture, as well as the history of the surveillance state.
Alistair Black is professor emeritus in the School of Information Sciences, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA, but lives and researches in the UK. He has published extensively, over many years, on the history of information management and libraries.
Bonnie Mak is a historian of ancient, medieval, and modern information practices. She is associate professor in the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA, and the author of How the Page Matters (2011).
Laura Skouvig is associate professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. She has co-edited Histories of Surveillance from Antiquity to the Digital Era. The Eyes and Ears of Power (2021) and has written about information and surveillance in eighteenth-century Denmark.
