Pacific Automobilism

The beginning of the 21st century has seen important shifts in mobility cultures around the world, as the West’s media-driven car culture has contrasted with existing local mobilities, from rickshaws in India and minibuses in Africa to cycling in China. In this expansive volume, historian Gijs Mom explores how contemporary mobility has been impacted by social, political, and economic forces on a global scale, as in light of local mobility cultures, the car as an ‘adventure machine’ seems to lose cultural influence in favor of the car’s status character.

The beginning of the 21st century has seen important shifts in mobility cultures around the world, as the West's media-driven car culture has contrasted against existing local mobilities, from rickshaws in India and minibuses in Africa to cycling in China. In this expansive volume, historian Gijs Mom explores how contemporary mobility has been impacted by social, political, and economic forces on a global scale, as in light of local mobility cultures, the car as an 'adventure machine' seems to lose cultural influence in favor of the car's status character.

Why has “car society” proven so durable, even in the face of mounting environmental and economic crises? In this follow-up to his magisterial Atlantic Automobilism, Gijs Mom traces the global spread of the automobile in the postwar era and investigates why adopting more sustainable forms of mobility has proven so difficult. Drawing on archival research as well as wide-ranging forays into popular culture, Mom reveals here the roots of the exuberance, excess, and danger that define modern automotive culture.

The idea of "understanding the present through its history" is based on two insights. First, it helps to know where a technology comes from: what were its predecessors, how did they evolve as a result of the continuous efforts to solve theoretical and practical problems, who were crucial in their emergence, and which cultural differences made them develop into divergent families of artifacts? Second, and closely related to the first insight, how does a certain technology or system fit into its societal context, its culture of mobility, its engineering culture, its culture of car driving, its alternatives, its opponents? Only thus, by studying its prehistory and its socio-cultural context, can we acquire a true 'grasp' of a technology. The Evolution of Automotive Technology: A Handbook, Second Edition covers one and a quarter century of the automobile, conceived as a cultural history of its technology, aimed at engineering students and all those who wish to have a concise introduction into the basics of automotive technology and its long-term development. (ISBN:9781468605976 ISBN:9781468605969 ISBN:9781468605983 DOI:10.4271/9781468605976) 2nd Edition.

Includes book reviews and bibliographies.

Our continued use of the combustion engine car in the 21st century, despite many rational arguments against it, makes it more and more difficult to imagine that transport has a sustainable future. Offering a sweeping transatlantic perspective, this book explains the current obsession with automobiles by delving deep into the motives of early car users. It provides a synthesis of our knowledge about the emergence and persistence of the car, using a broad range of material including novels, poems, films, and songs to unearth the desires that shaped our present “car society.” Combining social, psychological, and structural explanations, the author concludes that the ability of cars to convey transcendental experience, especially for men, explains our attachment to the vehicle.