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`A New Way of Flying'

Différance, Rhetoric and the Autogiro in Interwar Aviation

Department of Science and Technology Studies, Cornell University, 630 Clark Hall, Ithaca, New York 14853, USA; fax: +1 607 255 6044; ccm17{at}cornell.edu

The autogiro, a rotary-wing aircraft driven by a propeller, was created after World War I as a safe alternative to the airplane. Its resemblance to helicopters and airplanes made differentiating it an important rhetorical task for its supporters. With time, the autogiro took on new interpretations, and with them new processes of differentiation. The autogiro, airplane and helicopter all evolved, leading to instabilities of meaning, fixed temporarily by mechanisms of closure. I explore the relevance of Derridean différance for constructivist views of technology in tracing the flexible, differential meanings of the autogiro.

Key Words: closure • Derrida • difference • discourse • social construction • technology

Social Studies of Science, Vol. 30, No. 4, 513-543 (2000)
DOI: 10.1177/030631200030004002


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