

Of Men and Machines. New Approaches Towards the History of the “Digital Society” – a Methodological Travelogue
Digital technologies profoundly shape our 21st-century world. However, they also have a considerable history already. From its inception in the 1950s, the digital computer has become a global phenomenon with far-reaching social, cultural, economic, ecological, and political implications. In his lecture, Michael Homberg will examine this long and eventful history of the digital age, its actors, institutions and practices with a focus on the Federal Republic of Germany and with a sideways glance to (Western) Europe and the USA, as well as India and the Global South. When and where did the pathways to the “digital society” begin and how is this history written?
This event is co-organized by the Utrecht Germany Research Network and the Descartes Centre.
About the speaker
Michael Homberg heads the research department “Media and Information Society” at the Leibniz Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam (Leibniz-Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung, ZZF). He has been working and researching at the ZZF since 2020 with a focus on digital and media history. Here, he currently coordinates the research group “Digital Inequalities. Divides, Hierarchies, and Boundaries in Germany, 1970s to 1990s”. Previously, he was a fellow at Stanford University, UC Berkeley and Harvard University. He submitted his PhD thesis at the University of Cologne in 2015, and he completed his habilitation thesis at the University of Potsdam in 2022. For his research, he has received numerous grants and scholarships, including the Conrad-Matschoß-Prize 2023 as well as the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize, awarded by the German Research Foundation.
- Start date and time
- End date and time
- Location
- Janskerkhof 2-3, room 109
- Entrance fee
- Free
- Registration
You can join this lecture also online.