Text written with a typewriter is not the same as text written by hand, composed on a computer, sent in a text message, or generated by artificial intelligence. Like all media, the typewriter does not just transmit what a person wants to write. It is its own particular medium. In the 20th century, it changed the way writers write and the way people read—profoundly altering warfare, commerce, literature, and, perhaps most dramatically, gender relations.

Media Objects is produced in collaboration with Media Studies at Cornell University. With support from the college of Arts and Sciences and the Society for the Humanities. Editing and academic counsel from Erik Born, Jeremy Braddock, and Paul Fleming.