Approach to a history of science and technology in Azuay (19th and twentieth centuries)

The project aims to offer the public a state of situation that allows to make the nature, origins and development of science and technology in Azuay and its area of influence visible, depending on the adaptation and application of them to the regional progress. With this purpose, the project evolutionarily examines those factors that in Azuay have favored education, urbanization, commerce and contemporary industrialization, with an accent in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It uses the historical method to analyze documentation related to the renewal of traditional forms of work and knowledge, a necessary process in a community that seeks to progress around higher education. The main approach to the theme to investigate will be carried out from the scientific and technological contributions produced by university professors since the nineteenth century, when the university is founded until the present date, although without neglecting significant history. Apart from this, these facts will be related to the social dynamics in register, trying to determine their degree of incidence in the human development of the region. This proposal becomes more interest in today since Cuenca has been declared a University City and the University of Cuenca, Regional University. So that it is urgent to form a historical corpus that can encourage new multidisciplinary research from humanists and technicians, and reinforce a competitiveness profile against other cities that have also been declared as university students. After the first year of research, it is expected to disseminate the results of the project in a seminar destined to nurture the discussion about the science-technology-development triad. During the course of the investigation, the elaboration of two articles for specialized magazines is expected. The final results will be collected in a book composed of the works of the participating researchers, dynamized by significant oral and iconographic sources.

X RESEARCH PROJECT COMPETITION, V RESEARCH PROGRAM COMPETITION.