Leo Marx

Leo Marx was the Professor of American Cultural History (Emeritus) Program in Science, Technology, and Society (STS) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Leo Marx’s work examined the relationship between technology and culture in 19th and 20th century America. He is the author of The Machine in the Garden: Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America (1964), The Pilot and the Passenger: Essays on Literature, Technology, and Culture in America (1988), and editor, with Merritt Roe Smith, of Does Technology Drive History?: The Dilemma of Technological Determinism (1994). Marx received his B.A. (History and Literature, 1941) and his Ph.D. (History of American Civilization, 1950) from Harvard University. He taught at the University of Minnesota and Amherst College before coming to MIT in 1976. He was three times a Fulbright Lecturer in Europe, twice a Guggenheim Fellow, and a Rockefeller Fellow. He was a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, former president of the American Studies Association, and former chair of the American Literature Section of the Modern Language Association.