Morgondagens experter : Tekniken, ungdomen och framsteget i populärvetenskap och science fiction i Sverige under det långa 1950-talet

Sammanfattning: This study analyzes different views of science, technology and progress in popular science and science fiction published in Sweden during the 'long 1950s' (ca 1946-1964) and how they were related to youth. In the first part, popular technical periodicals are discussed - Teknikes Värld (Technical World) and Teknik för Alla (Technolvgy for Everyone). They pictured a world where atomic bombs, nuclear power, space rockets md the automatic factory had become part of normality. But while Teknikens Värld expressed a technocratic view of technology, progress was re-negotiated in Teknik för Alla. For Teknik för Alla, it was the younger generation who should recapture thebelief in progress and become tomorrow's experts.The second part deals with popular space literature. With the cold war and the nuclear arms race in the background, the advocates of the space project claimed that it ought to be an international enterprise. The past, our time, and the future were woven together in space - where mankind could continue to develop culturally and progress could be recaptured by the youth. These visions disappeared with the advent of Russian Sputnik satellites in 1957.The third part deals with science fiction. Many writers of popular science advocated a realistic science fiction in order to get young people interested in the world of technology. The two Swedish science fiction periodicals during the period, Häpna! (Be Amazed!) and Galaxy, went even further and advocated a crilical science fiction distinguished from other popular culture. Most of the science fiction narratives took place in future high-tech societics where space ships with nuclear engines and doomsday weapons were part of everyday life. As in the popular science literarure, the depictions of technological development were ambivalent.Through the popular science and science fiction literature the new technologies were normalized and domesticized. The Atom become part of everyday life.