Abstract
Circus, Science and Technology is an edited volume that explores circus as a site in and through which science and technology are represented in popular culture. In eight chapters written by leading scholars from fields as varied as performance and circus studies, art, media and cultural history, and engineering, the book breaks new ground in examining to what extent the engineering of circus and performing bodies can be understood as a strategy to promote awe, how technological inventions have shaped circus and the cultures it helps constitute—and how much of a mutual shaping this is. The introduction highlights in what sense circus can provide a versatile frame for interpreting our relationship with technology. It carves out the distinctiveness of the volume and its contribution to the popular history of technology, the cultural history of engineering and the history of popular performance. It draws attention to the material, practical nature of popular entertainments, and to their imaginaries in other media. (Studying) circus contributes to a better understanding of the globalised modern culture of technological wonder, and how it is formative for the present and the future.
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Jürgens, AS. (2020). Circus Matters: Engineering, Imagineering and Popular Stages of Technology—Introduction. In: Jürgens, AS. (eds) Circus, Science and Technology. Palgrave Studies in Performance and Technology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-43298-0_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-43298-0_1
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