The Server: A Media History from the Present to the Baroque

A chopping‑edge media historical past on a perennially fascinating matter, which makes an attempt to reply the essential query: Who is in cost, the servant or the grasp?​

Though traditional servants like the butler or the governess have largely vanished, the Internet is stuffed with servers: internet, ftp, mail, and others carry out their day by day drudgery, going about their enterprise noiselessly and unnoticed. Why then are present‑day digital drudges known as servers? Markus Krajewski explores this query by going from the current again to the Baroque to research historic points of service by numerous views, be it the servants’ relationship to structure or their operate in literary or scientific contexts. At the intersection of media research, cultural historical past, and literature, this work recounts the gradual transition of company from human to nonhuman actors to present how the idea of the digital server stems from the traditional function of the servant.