Keywords
COBOL, software, programming languages, technology, Dijkstra, computing, social history, HoPL
Abstract
This paper writes a social history of the programming language COBOL that focuses on its reception in academia. Through this focus, the paper seeks to understand the contentious relationship between data processing and the academy. In historicizing COBOL, the paper also illuminates the changing nature of the academy-industry-military triangle that was a mainstay of early computing.
Recommended Citation
Shah, Neel (2022) "COBOL Cripples The Mind!: Academia and the Alienation of Data Processing," Swarthmore Undergraduate History Journal: 3 (2), 94-105. https://works.swarthmore.edu/suhj/vol3/iss2/6
Included in
Data Storage Systems Commons, History of Science, Technology, and Medicine Commons, Intellectual History Commons, Social History Commons