ABSTRACT
Over the past two decades or so, there has been the constant sense that we are going through a period of particularly rapid and intensive change. Indeed, it has been frequently argued that this last quarter of the twentieth century is without precedent in the scale, scope and speed of historical transformation. The only certainty for the future, we are told, is that it will be very different from today, and that it will become different more quickly than ever before. No-one will be able to absent themselves from these great transformations, no-one’s daily life will be immune from the upheaval and turmoil of change. And, of course, we are told that the reason for these escalating transformations-the reason for their necessity and inevitability-is technological revolution. The idea of technological revolution has become normative-routine and commonplace-in our technocultural times.
