HSS mentorship, for young scholars

For those young scholars among Americanscience readers, take note of the opportunity to benefit from HSS veterans' wisdom at November's History of Science Society Annual Meeting.

Seasoned scholars, take note that the mentorship programs needs your wisdom.

And everyone, take note that you have to get involved by September 15, 2010.

What have you been reading this summer?

Historians of science in America, what have you been reading? What was worth the effort so far this summer?

Share some recommendations.

I just finished Louis Menand's _The Marketplace of Ideas._ Don't be fooled: this is really a book of lectures about the university only loosely tied to the "marketplace" or tied to one another. It did have its moments, however. Read more...



Chapter two struck me as most worth reading, especially for those who teach or research the Cold War university. Menand takes a story we know best for the sciences and applies it to the humanities. In the process, he provides a new way of thinking about the culture wars---or the "crisis of the humanities." His presentation rejects one structural explanation and posits another. First the rejection: a diversified student body did not force multiculturalism and deconstruction on the humanities. "It is wise to avoid the following narrative," writes Menand: "when more women and non-whites came into the system, traditional norms of scholarly constraint disappeared. The argument is not that this narrative is undesirable---although one sometimes hears proponents of diversity reiterating an upbeat version of it. The argument is that the narrative is incorrect."(91)

Menand argues instead that the Cold War university had built a model for the humanities---a "Golden Age" of the humanities---that could not be sustained. The humanities during the Cold War enjoyed unprecedented growth, especially in graduate studies, and devoted huge resources to "scientistic" research programs that promised access to the realm of value-neutral, objective knowledge to those researchers who stuck to firm disciplinary norms. Menand surprised me with how well this outline fit even for literature departments.

Scholars of Kuhn's generation (like Paul de Man in literature) challenged the Cold War humanities on intellectual grounds (with a little help from the Vietnam War). Only then did a diversifying student body come into play---student interest added fuel to an already burning fire. I think Menand underplays student agency in this story, but I understand he's fighting a narrative that has laid too much credit (or rather, blame) on students' shoulders.

As Menand summarizes, "Within the history of education, the Cold War university was the anomaly, and what are criticized as deviations and diffusions in the present system are largely reactions against that earlier dispensation. People may admire the old dispensation, or feel some nostalgia for it, but it was fundamentally untenable."(91)

"a symbol of American technological verisimilitude"

This may wrap up our "Scuttling the Shuttle" series. Historian Roger Launius puts in his two cents on his terrific blog. He's taking a Baltic cruise and giving a bunch of fascinating lectures for the Smithsonian Journeys program. Where do I sign up?

At any rate, Launius describes a lecture called "Whither the Space Shuttle?":

This presentation reviews the history and legacy of the Space Shuttle program after thirty years. It suggests that while the shuttle was not an unadulterated success, on balance it served a venerable role in spaceflight and deserves an overall positive assessment in history. Additionally, the Space Shuttle provided three decades of significant human spaceflight capability and stretched the nature of what could be accomplished in Earth orbit much beyond anything envisioned previously. Most significantly since the American human spaceflight program has always been focused in national prestige, the Space Shuttle served well as a symbol of American technological verisimilitude. Finally, this presentation discusses the retirement of the Space Shuttle and possibilities for the future of human spaceflight.

If you want a sense of how Launius answers those final questions, check out his earlier posts (here) and (here). He also has an extensive bibliography on the shuttle posted here.

Because Ether Doesn't Propagate Itself

Or who knows, maybe it does.

At any rate, our History of Science blogging friends at Ether Wave Propaganda are on vacation. That provides us the perfect opportunity to point back to a terrific, recent post on the history of science in America that you might of missed.

Will Thomas offers a vivid and engaging reading of Paul Lucier's 2009 Isis article, "The Professional and Scientist in Nineteenth Century America." I recall my own astonishment at learning (as a fresh graduate student) the recent origin of the label "scientist"---who could imagine a world without scientists, as such, I wondered. As Thomas relates in his post, Lucier gives us plenty more material about the recent origins of apparently natural labels and distinctions that should similarly astonish our students in years to come.

Historians of Science in America have probably already taken note of Lucier's 2008 book, Scientists and Swindlers. Forum steering committee member David Spanagel wrote a particularly useful review (but you need a subscription to see it) for the most recent Isis. I'm inspired by it to put on my syllabus for American environmental history either Lucier's chapter on the "technological science of kerosene" or the "rock oil report." Any other recommendations?