[DOWNLOAD] "Cultures in Orbit" by Lisa Parks " eBook PDF Kindle ePub Free

eBook details
- Title: Cultures in Orbit
- Author : Lisa Parks
- Release Date : January 20, 2005
- Genre: Social Science,Books,Nonfiction,Professional & Technical,Engineering,
- Pages : * pages
- Size : 7743 KB
Description
In 1957 Sputnik, the worldās first man-made satellite, dazzled people as it zipped around the planet. By the beginning of the twenty-first century, more than eight thousand satellites orbited the Earth, and satellite practices such as live transmission, direct broadcasting, remote sensing, and astronomical observation had altered how we imagined ourselves in relation to others and our planet within the cosmos. In Cultures in Orbit, Lisa Parks analyzes these satellite practices and shows how they have affected meanings of āthe globalā and āthe televisual.ā Parks suggests that the convergence of broadcast, satellite, and computer technologies necessitates an expanded definition of ātelevision,ā one that encompasses practices of military monitoring and scientific observation as well as commercial entertainment and public broadcasting.Roaming across the disciplines of media studies, geography, and science and technology studies, Parks examines uses of satellites by broadcasters, military officials, archaeologists, and astronomers. She looks at Our World, a live intercontinental television program that reached five hundred million viewers in 1967, and Imparja tv, an Aboriginal satellite tv network in Australia. Turning to satellitesā remote-sensing capabilities, she explores the U.S. militaryās production of satellite images of the war in Bosnia as well as archaeologistsā use of satellites in the excavation of Cleopatraās palace in Alexandria, Egypt. Parksās reflections on how Western fantasies of control are implicated in the Hubble telescopeās views of outer space point to a broader concern: that while satellite uses promise a āglobal village,ā they also cut and divide the planet in ways that extend the hegemony of the post-industrial West. In focusing on such contradictions, Parks highlights how satellites cross paths with cultural politics and social struggles.