Until fairly recently, only serial killers and lunatics had profiles. Yet today, almost everyone is profiled through social media, mobile phones, and a multitude of other methods. But where does the idea of “profiling” come from, how has it changed over time, and what are its implications? In this book, Andreas Bernard examines contemporary profiling’s roots in late-nineteenth-century criminology, psychology, and psychiatry. Data collection techniques previously used exclusively by police or...
Before skyscrapers forever transformed the landscape of the modern metropolis, the conveyance that made them possible had to be created. Invented in New York in the 1850s, the elevator became an urban fact of life on both sides of the Atlantic by the early twentieth century. While it may at first glance seem a modest innovation, it had wide-ranging effects, from fundamentally restructuring building design to reinforcing social class hierarchies by moving luxury apartments to upper levels,...
