Technomagic, or going back to objects

Abstract

Is technoscience magic, and how can such an arcane and archaic practice as magic be relevant to what is considered as totally modern, rational and emancipatory, namely science and technology?

Starting from Vincenzo Susca’s book “Gioia tragica”, the debate shows all of the continuities between technics and magics, so much so that it is possible to talk about to the term “technomagic”. Such continuities are framed within an STS perspective by Giuseppina Pellegrino.

The concept of technomagic is then contextualized in relation to the “society of the spectacle”, whose latest development is the web 2.0 (Attimonelli); to the cinema as an immersive medium (De Ruggieri); to the ambivalence of technics, which is subjected to a permanent back-and-forth between obsolescence and reenchantment (Susca).