Preface: This is the second of three session proposals organized by the Promethean (Engineering) SIG’s working group on history and engineering education. We have grouped these papers/sessions according to the themes of “global perspectives” (A), “the history of US engineering education” (B), and “humanistic-social education in engineering curricula” (C). This proposal covers the second of these themes. If all three sessions are accepted, we recommend that they appear in the program in this sequence.

With the global developments described in Session (A) as a backdrop, our hope is to continue our conversation by turning to historical developments in engineering education in the United States. The three papers in this session span the entire period of engineering professionalization in the US, from the origins of its first professional societies (Am. Inst. of Mining Engineers, as described by Johnson), to the blossoming of its academic institutions (MIT, as described by Basset), to postwar struggles to redefine engineering curricula (described in the case studies of both Basset and Knowles). More importantly, the papers, in their combination, examine the different institutional components—professional societies, academic institutions, and industrial interests that served to give new articulation to engineering professional identities throughout this period. Also, the works by Basset and Knowledge, in particular, look beyond traditional ways in which we have come to view the history of the engineering profession by examining the “Asianization of the engineering workforce,” and the extent to which a broad postwar rhetoric of hazards served to realign the disciplinary orientation and institutional configurations that had served as a foundation for engineering curricula and identity during earlier decades. Collectively, these papers should serve to broaden the way in which we look at the history of engineering education in the United States.