Steven Johnson Summary

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Steven Johnson attended St. Albans School where he completed his undergraduate degree at Brown University, where he studied semiotics, a part of the school’s modern culture and media department (About, “Steven Berlin Johnson”, 2014). Additionally, he has a graduate degree in English literature from Columbia University and is a contributing editor to Wired magazine and is the 2009 Hearst New Media Professional-in-Residence at The Journalism School, Columbia University. He is the best-selling author of four books on the intersection of science, technology, and personal experience.

1. THE SUMMARY:

During the summer of 1854, London is in the process of emerging as one of the first modern cities in the world. Lacking infrastructure

He started off by painting a good picture of the scavenging lower class in London during 1854. During the next couple of chapters, a physician named John Snow is introduced. We learn how he created the anesthesia “ether” and how it became a success, as well as the miasma theory. This theory claimed that all causes of disease were in the air and in the surroundings, but Snow didn’t believe that was the case because of the way the disease was spreading and confined to a specific area. This influenced his hypothesis, and ultimate conclusion, that water was the culprit. The next few chapters really show how desperate society was growing in medicine and how they had many trials and errors to get to where we are today. We see how Snow used the creation of the map, assisted by Reverend Henry Whitehead, to unravel patterns of the

Johnson argues the importance of critical and integrative thinking, the realm of complexity and relativity and the core between scientific advancement and social theory. These ideas may be more relevant today than ever before.

4. THE SOURCES:

a. Primary sources:

1) Morning Chronicle (Johnson, 51)

2) Punch (Johnson, 63)

3) The London Times (Johnson, 11)

Secondary Sources:

1) “Bleak House” (1852) (Johnson, pg. 88)

2) “The Cholera in Berwick Street” (1854) (Johnson, pg. 169)

3) “Little Dorrit” (1857) (Johnson, pg. 29)

a. THE EVIDENCE:

“THE NIGHT SOIL MEN”

a) In chapter one, Johnson mainly discusses the contaminated conditions in England at the time, how the outbreak began to broaden, and discusses the people that reside there – the ones who made their living dealing with waste.

b) He argues the possible causes for the spread of the disease and whom it was affecting most. He states the awful conditions of London at the time could be a culprit to the spreading of the outbreak as well.

c) Johnson goes into detail about those who made a living dealing with waste by depicting those who gathered human waste as “rakers”.

- (pg. 8)

“EYES SUNK, LIPS DARK