Mother of invention : how good ideas get ignored in an economy built for men

The Resource Mother of invention : how good ideas get ignored in an economy built for men
Label
Mother of invention : how good ideas get ignored in an economy built for men
Title remainder
how good ideas get ignored in an economy built for men
Statement of responsibility
Katrine Marçal ; translated by Alex Fleming
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Author
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Subject
Language
  • eng
  • swe
  • eng
Summary
The wheel was invented some 5,000 years ago, and the modern suitcase in the mid-nineteenth century, but it wasn't until the 1970s that someone successfully married the two. What was the hold up? For writer and journalist Katrine Marçal, the answer is both shocking and simple: because "real men" carried their bags, no matter how heavy. There were rolling suitcases before the '70s, but they were marketed as a niche product for (the presumably few) women travelling alone, and the wheeled suitcase wasn't "invented" until it was no longer threatening to masculinity. Mother of Invention draws on this example and many others, from electric cars to tech billionaires, to show how gender bias stifles the economy and holds us back. Our traditional notions about men and women have delayed innovations, sometimes by hundreds of years, and have distorted our understanding of our history. While we talk about the Iron Age and the Bronze Age, we might as well talk about the Ceramic Age or the Flax Age, since these technologies were just as important. But inventions associated with women are not considered to be technology in the same way. Marçal takes us on a tour of the global economy, arguing that gendered assumptions dictate which businesses get funding, how we value work, and how we trace human progress."--
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Cataloging source
YDX
Dewey number
604.82
Index
no index present
LC call number
T36
LC item number
.M37 2021
Literary form
non fiction
Nature of contents
bibliography
Target audience
adult

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Context of Mother of invention : how good ideas get ignored in an economy built for men

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