The unsettled clock : the persistence of time pluralism / Kevin Birth.

By: Material type: TextTextPublisher: New York ; Oxford : Berghahn, 2026Copyright date: ©2026Description: ix, 222 pages : illustrations ; 24 cmContent type:
  • text
Media type:
  • unmediated
Carrier type:
  • volume
ISBN:
  • 9781836955399
  • 1836955391
Subject(s): Additional physical formats: Online version: Unsettled clock; ebook version :: No title
Contents:
Introduction. What is time pluralism? -- Producing public timekeeping and time pluralism -- A bell for every market : time pluralism in late medieval York -- Cosmopolitan times : time pluralism in Habsburg horology -- Time pluralism and scientists' choices -- Humbuggery and time pluralism : nineteenth-century time gambits -- Time pluralism and current timescales -- Using atoms versus Earth's rotation -- Time pluralism and the leap second problem -- Unsettling the clock.
Summary: "The history of timekeeping has always involved choosing or converting between various ways of representing time, a phenomenon called time pluralism. The Unsettled Clock: The Persistence of Time Pluralism explores time pluralism by documenting historical cases and examining its persistence in present. Drawing examples from medieval York, the Habsburg empire of early modern Europe, Renaissance astronomy, legal time in the US and UK before time zones were adopted, and the persistence of time pluralism in current atomic time metrology, this analysis offers a political and historical look into how timekeeping has been shaped, challenged, and manipulated"-- Provided by publisher.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number Status Notes Date due Barcode
Books Books Jost Bürgi Library Reading Room QB223 .B57 2026 (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Available Inscribed by the author. 3156000017851

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Introduction. What is time pluralism? -- Producing public timekeeping and time pluralism -- A bell for every market : time pluralism in late medieval York -- Cosmopolitan times : time pluralism in Habsburg horology -- Time pluralism and scientists' choices -- Humbuggery and time pluralism : nineteenth-century time gambits -- Time pluralism and current timescales -- Using atoms versus Earth's rotation -- Time pluralism and the leap second problem -- Unsettling the clock.

"The history of timekeeping has always involved choosing or converting between various ways of representing time, a phenomenon called time pluralism. The Unsettled Clock: The Persistence of Time Pluralism explores time pluralism by documenting historical cases and examining its persistence in present. Drawing examples from medieval York, the Habsburg empire of early modern Europe, Renaissance astronomy, legal time in the US and UK before time zones were adopted, and the persistence of time pluralism in current atomic time metrology, this analysis offers a political and historical look into how timekeeping has been shaped, challenged, and manipulated"-- Provided by publisher.

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