Fall, Mortality, and the Machine: Tolkien and Technology – Alan Jacobs – The Atlantic.
The above link is to an article discussing one of Tolkein’s enduring bequeaths to Fantasy literature – that technology is the enemy.  This still plays out in literatures and stereotypes today.  How many boffer larpers talk about what they do as a chance to escape modern technology? The SCA has more right to aim for this ethic, as it aims to tackle things from a historical bent, but again there are lots of people who describe it as their opportunity to escape the computers and cell phones, and to portray a fictional character. The dominant element in almost every Fantasy setting (in fact, one of the usual defining elements of the genre) is a world without technology. Not that all fantasy worlds are pastoral and idyllic (Lieber and Martin are clear examples of urban and gritty works), but that somehow, if you include technology you are either ‘Urban Fantasy’ or ‘Sci-Fi’. Or perhaps, ‘Steampunk’ depending on the technology in question.
So, I ask you, help me make a list of Fantasy genre items where Technology is not a banished evil or a hallmark of the enemy.  Off the top of my head, Pratchett’s Discworld embraces technology, although in his characteristic tongue in cheek nature.  Rosenberg’s Guardians of The  Flame starts in a standard world, but with the element of ‘Mundane transported to fantasy world’ addresses the introduction of modern sciences and technologies to a fantasy setting.  Stasheff layers a fantasy world on top of a sci-fi universe in the Warlock series. Piers Anthony has mirrored (almost literally) sci-fi and fantasy worlds in the same books, but in many ways this only serves to reinforce the ‘technology bad, pre-industrial good’ vibe.  Harry Potter likewise uses the notion of pre-industrial/post-industrial as a separator and implies that the post-industrial world is inferior.
Where are the things that can be definitively lumped as Fantasy, but don’t try to claim, outright or through inference, that ours is the wrong world to live in, and that technology is the ruin of all?
Star Wars is a distinctly fantasy universe both in movie and book. I would say that there are overtones toward the evils of technology, but there it is more technology run rampant and over-reliance upon technology (e.g. the Death Star and Darth Vader, respectively), but technology itself isn’t an evil–it is an everyday necessity. It adds to the technology a mystical element, and, in some of the later books, the story takes a turn such that the race with bio-“machines” are portrayed as utterly grotesque and death worshipping. It is an extreme example since more of the natural people are portrayed well, but in such a diverse galaxy there is a wider spectrum of possibilities (I should also point out that the reason Yoda is in an extreme bio-habitat is not because of his disdain for technology, but because he is hiding and one of the heroes is a machine). Moreover, one of the mistakes I have heard some people make (and I was even somewhat guilty of years ago) is lumping Star Wars in with science fiction simply because it takes place in space and there are lots of machines.
While speaking of Pratchett, Good Omens does its part not by pointing to technology as evil, but by noting how much evil can be caused by disrupting it.
I would also lump Rothfuss ( The Name of the Wind) in the category of (at least) technology neutral. Technology in his world goes hand-in-hand with magic. There is not a huge amount of either one, though there is an implication that more existed at some point in the past, but the result is that technology is a curiosity and a luxury, not the enemy.
Yes, over on LJ I got into the Star Wars argument. Now, I haven’t read the books, so that does limit my standing. The movies (not the prequels) are clearly a Campbell style mythos story, and I’m not sure where I am on the dividing line between fantasy and mythology, but Star Wars is right in there. I do agree that space and technology are much more the setting and much less the plot (as it almost must be for something to be Sci-Fi). Star Wars (and Firefly) has the notion of a centralized juggernaut and fringe socieites. Anytime we see a habitat, extreme or not, it tends to be on the fringe worlds. The central juggernaut we see explicitly in a framework of nonnatural settings, Death Stars, Star Destroyers, heck, one of the clues to the moral ambiguity of Londo may be the fact that he lives in a technological marvel floating detached from a planetary surface. Yes R2D2 and C3PO are on the heroes side, but C3PO is the only robot in the movies that effects such an emotional stance, and R2D2 comes across as the electronic version of Toto or Lassie. Even in the clothing styles of the characters, the good guys are represented by fabrics that drape organically and the good guys wear hard plastic helmets, crisp panel-like uniforms, etc. The general exception here is Jabba, but he is as much an athropomorphization of the ID as anything else, and is a dehumanized character falling into the monster category. And even he is in plotlines involving technology as something to be feared – carbonite and thermonuclear detonators….
I will add Rothfuss to my ‘to read’ list.
I think Star Wars is both fantasy and mythology, in large part because what we envision as fantasy are more recently generated mythologies being played out. Why Star Wars appears closer to mythology than fantasy is the medium of the movies which, by their very nature, cannot fully develop character since all you see are the outward manifestations.
It also may be cliche, but Star Wars tries for a balance (that is what the Jedi always harp on), so the problem with the bad guys and why the hard material is bad is because they are going so far as to completely do away with life. The good guys use both. This is nitpicking, but I think there is a strong argument to make that Star Wars doesn’t *totally* villainize technology, but runaway technology. As you point out, there is a counter argument about the moral messages, but ultimately Lando is a hero to everyone. You also need to take into account the prequels–yes, there is the droid army, but the center of the good “Old Republic” is a planet-city (I suspect that the change in presentation of Coruscant between films has more to do with the film-making philosophy than anything else).
No, it doesn’t totally villanize technology. One of the hallmarks of Luke’s progression is making his own light saber. And he’s supposed to be pretty good with technology in general, building, repairing, evaluating things.
What a information of un-ambiguity and preserveness of precious know-how concerning unexpected emotions.