About this Event
Please welcome Deb Chachra and Austin Kleon to celebrate How Infrastructure Works!
This event is free and open to the public.
- Start time: 7:00 P.M.
- Run time: 45-60 minutes, followed by a signing line.
- Location: The second floor of BookPeople.
The author will be signing and personalizing copies of the book after the speaking portion of the event.
- To get a book signed, a copy of the event book or an item of equal value must be purchased from BookPeople.
Guidelines:
- Seating will be on a first-come, first-served basis.
- There will not be a live stream or recording available.
- BookPeople reserves the right to cancel or postpone this event if necessary.
- If you have any other questions, please visit our Eventbrite FAQ. If your question isn't covered in the FAQ, feel free to email us at [email protected].
About the book:
Infrastructure is a marvel, meeting our basic needs and enabling lives of astounding ease and productivity that would have been unimaginable just a century ago. It is the physical manifestation of our social contract—of our ability to work collectively for the public good—and it consists of the most complex and vast technological systems ever created by humans.
A soaring bridge is an obvious infrastructural feat, but so are the mostly hidden reservoirs, transformers, sewers, cables, and pipes that deliver water, energy, and information to wherever we need it. When these systems work well, they hide in plain sight. Engineer and materials scientist Deb Chachra takes readers on a fascinating tour of these essential utilities, revealing how they work, what it takes to keep them running, just how much we rely on them—but also, who they work well for, and who pays the costs.
Across the US and elsewhere, these systems are suffering from systemic neglect and the effects of climate change, becoming unavoidably visible when they break down. Communities that are already marginalized often bear the brunt of these failures. But Chachra maps out a path for transforming and rebuilding our shared infrastructure to be not just functional, but also equitable, resilient and sustainable. The cost of not being able to rely on these systems is unthinkably high. We need to learn how to see them—and fix them, together—before it’s too late.
About the author:
Deb Chachra is a professor at Olin College of Engineering with a technical background in engineering physics and materials science. She writes the newsletter Metafoundry and creates and communicates widely at the intersection of technology and society, including pieces for the Atlantic, the Guardian, the journal Nature and the comic book Bitch Planet. Her research and ideas have been recognized and supported by awards from the Sloan Foundation, the National Science Foundation, Autodesk, and others. Chachra lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
About the moderator:
Austin Kleon is the New York Times bestselling author of a trilogy of illustrated books about creativity in the digital age: Steal Like An Artist, Show Your Work!, and Keep Going. He’s also the author of Newspaper Blackout, a collection of poems made by redacting the newspaper with a permanent marker. His books have been translated into dozens of languages and have sold over a million copies worldwide. He’s been featured on NPR’s Morning Edition, PBS Newshour, and in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. New York Magazine called his work “brilliant,” The Atlantic called him “positively one of the most interesting people on the Internet,” and The New Yorker said his poems “resurrect the newspaper when everybody else is declaring it dead.” He speaks for organizations such as Pixar, Google, SXSW, TEDx, and The Economist. In previous lives, he worked as a librarian, a web designer, and an advertising copywriter. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife and sons. Visit him online at www.austinkleon.com
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Thank you for supporting Deb Chachra, Austin Kleon, and your local independent bookstore!
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
BookPeople, 603 North Lamar Boulevard, Austin, United States
USD 0.00