MASTERARBEIT - Institut für Wissenschaftsforschung - Universität ...

LITERATURE & BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Before digging deep into some detailed aspects of the development
of Zeppelin’s airships, I believe it to be necessary - or at least very
helpful - to provide a short introduction to the subject. As it will
be explicated in chapter 3, my primary goal is not to unveil new
facts about Zeppelin or his airship. Nor am I going to write the
thousandth piece on the man or his invention - there is plenty of
works covering those issues already. Instead, I want to use the story
of how the zeppelins came into being as a case to showcase some STS
concepts. While applying STS conceptions on it might also provide
new insights into the developments around Zeppelin and his airship,
my primary goal lies elsewhere: as mentioned in the introduction, the
main focus is to give a thorough explanation of how different, mainly
social, factors influenced the technology development and how the
technology development fed back to those factors. Both SCOT and STI
are going to provide new insights; as this perspective is apparently
missing in the discourse so far, this structured approach is what I am
trying to accomplish. Hence the historic part of this thesis stays with
shared narratives: The history around Zeppelin and his technology
given below are widely agreed on. It is the standard narrative that has
formed over decades that the phenomenon has been re-examined by
many and been told over and over again. The same is true for other
historic accounts about the time and society the events I write about
took place in. Here, too, I used available literature to draw a picture
to illustrate my case, without arguing whether or not the common
narratives about this time are authentic or not. Nevertheless, I find it
necessary to introduce the reader to those narratives. As most likely
not every reader is familiar with this particular part of history, I want
to provide some background knowledge. Therefore, I will give a
brief overview over the events that led to the development of airships
by count Zeppelin on the following pages. Then, I will give some
insights into the first steps of the technology development, which led
to the point my analysis is going to focus on.
Accounts about Count Zeppelin are virtually unanimous in respect
to the most important points regarding the man, his life and his work.
Almost all of them base widely on a biography by Hugo Eckener. [11]
At least this holds true for those that are commonly referred to as
sources for further writings about some facet of the zeppelin and
that are encountered in virtually any bibliography of pieces about
zeppelins. Eckener was a trained journalist, long lasting companion
of count Zeppelin as well as his successor (who actually brought the
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