Objects of Time How Things Shape Temporality

Every time you consult a calendar or clock, other people are thinking for you. Most users of these tools only know how to interpret the representations of time these objects provide, not the logics behind the representations. Those logics were others' ideas. This book looks at how the objects we use to think about time shape our thoughts. Such objects empower us to think about time certain ways, but they also contain hidden assumptions about time that deflect our awareness away from the complicated rhythms of our lives and our world. Because time ties together so many aspects of our lives, this book is able to explore the nexus of objects, cognition, culture, and even biology, and to do so in relationship to globalization. By using ethnographic and historical data, Birth argues that we must recognize the cognitive effects of our timekeeping devices, and that we must also recognize that they do not adequately capture many important aspects of time or life.

Kevin K. Birth is a professor of Anthropology at Queens College of the City university of New York. He is the author of numerous articles about time and two previous books, Any Time is Trinidad Time and Bacchanalian Sentiments.