In a post last month for the "Southern Roundtable" blog, Jay Malone (HSS executive director) makes a few noteworthy claims. For instance: historians of science and southern historians share peculiar senses of isolation in most history departments. Or:someone like William Dunbar (a Scot who came to North America in 1772 and became a planter) matters most to the history of science because he welcomed and supported visiting naturalists, like William Bartram or Alexander Wilson. (Also: tell me more about these visits. What they bring to mind most readily are the stops that Darwin made and recounted with Spanish officials on the Beagle voyage.)
But the most striking claim came in the title of the post. (And I know, I'm probably just showing my ignorance here.) What does "Southern Science" look like? Please, internet community, tell me more. (And, I know, you had the same question about "American Science." My question is: does a literature on "Southern Science" exist that parallels the larger American version?)
Selasa, 28 Februari 2012
Kamis, 23 Februari 2012
Looking Outward
In case you missed it, HSS president Lynn Nyhart used her column in the last newsletter to ask the history of science community of scholars to think expansively about the profession:
Nyhart also mentions our little experiment here and that HSS has opened up an on-line forum that---err, um---has not exactly caught on yet. I like this spirit of experimentation. I think the question for Google Group is: what does an HSS Forum do that H-Net can't? Any ideas?
Here's a thought: we could become "them." Instead of noticing (and complaining about) science writers who take our best material and get it not-quite right, we could sometimes choose–and then learn–to write the way they do. Instead of sighing over science textbooks that compress history into brief sidebars, we could work with their writers to show why history of science deserves not only more space but integration into the overall presentation of science. We could further encourage history of science students to become K–12 teachers, museum professionals, and film-makers, and seek out active means to funnel people headed for these futures into history of science courses. Instead of bemoaning the lack of science-cultural literacy among our politicians and government bureaucrats, we could prepare our students for non-academic jobs that engage with science-related public policy.I would add that we can and should push for integration of history of science into other branches of history. For us, that means making HOS a part of standard US history narratives.
Nyhart also mentions our little experiment here and that HSS has opened up an on-line forum that---err, um---has not exactly caught on yet. I like this spirit of experimentation. I think the question for Google Group is: what does an HSS Forum do that H-Net can't? Any ideas?
Psychology of Color
A fascinating CFP for a conference on "Color, Commerce, and Consumption in Global Historical Perspective" went up a while back. The due date has passed, so that is old news. But I finally got around to looking over this 2007 Chemical Heritage Foundation piece by the conference's convener --- on the history of DuPont's work with car colors. I expected it to be all about chemical dye production, so I was surprised and fascinated by this:
In January 1925 two DuPont managers discussed the company’s need for practical advice on the psychology of colors as a means to anticipate major color fads. DuPont took a chromatic leap in October 1925 when it hired Towle and created the Duco Color Advisory Service to design the latest and most desirable color combinations for the auto industry. Born in Brooklyn, Towle had studied painting at the Pratt Institute and the Art Students League. During World War I he put his art training to good use as a member of the U.S. Army’s celebrated Camouflage Corps. Afterward he adapted to the burgeoning world of advertising, working sequentially as art director for three New York agencies: H. K. McCann, Frank Seaman, and Campbell-Ewald. At Seaman he also served as the executive in charge of the DuPont account and as copy executive for Cadillac, Oldsmobile, La Salle, and Pontiac—all GM divisions.
The entire article is worth a read if you're interested in role of corporate scientists at the intersection of advertising, manufacturing, and business statistics.
Sabtu, 18 Februari 2012
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Selasa, 14 Februari 2012
Darwin vs. Lincoln: The Case of Pragmatism
This past weekend saw an interesting anniversary: the double birthday of Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln, who were born across the Atlantic from one another on 12 February 1809. When I thought about how to mark it here on the blog, my mind turned where it so often does: to pragmatism.
Why? These two figures (in the form of their involvement with evolutionary theory and the Civil War) buttress what is now perhaps the most famous account of pragmatism and its origins: Louis Menand's The Metaphysical Club, which won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 2002.
It's a captivating quadruple-biography and a compelling synthesis of lively philosophical ideas, in which Menand frames the development of "classical pragmatism" in the Cambridge of the 1870s as stemming from the joint impact of Darwin's theory of natural selection and various figures' relationship to the Civil War.
Certain reviewers questioned the strength of this Civil War connection, since only Menand's first protagonist (Holmes) served in it and his last (John Dewey) wasn't even six years old when it ended. That is, while the war was of course important, the lines drawn between it and philosophical ideas that emerged a decade later were not strong enough.
As a result (perhaps), Menand's subsequent treatments have tended to nudge the causal arrow further in the direction of Darwin and his evolutionary ideas. For example (and as an excellent hour-long summary of the book, for those who don't have time to read the whole thing), here's a lecture he gave on the book a couple years after it was published:
In it, Menand seemingly reappraises the balance between the impact of the Civil War and Darwin's theory in response to the very last question during the Q&A (beginning at 59:20), which was about the philosophical affinities between the "classical pragmatists" and their Common Sense forebears.
Menand acknowledges these connections, but then goes on to insist:
What is clear, taking the book and the lecture as a package – and acknowledging Menand's key role in the reemergence of pragmatism (and James) in the public imagination in the last decade – is the significance of last weekend's dual birthday in the context of renewed interest in a key set of ideas at the boundary between American intellectual history and the history of science.
Why? These two figures (in the form of their involvement with evolutionary theory and the Civil War) buttress what is now perhaps the most famous account of pragmatism and its origins: Louis Menand's The Metaphysical Club, which won the Pulitzer Prize for History in 2002.
It's a captivating quadruple-biography and a compelling synthesis of lively philosophical ideas, in which Menand frames the development of "classical pragmatism" in the Cambridge of the 1870s as stemming from the joint impact of Darwin's theory of natural selection and various figures' relationship to the Civil War.
Certain reviewers questioned the strength of this Civil War connection, since only Menand's first protagonist (Holmes) served in it and his last (John Dewey) wasn't even six years old when it ended. That is, while the war was of course important, the lines drawn between it and philosophical ideas that emerged a decade later were not strong enough.
As a result (perhaps), Menand's subsequent treatments have tended to nudge the causal arrow further in the direction of Darwin and his evolutionary ideas. For example (and as an excellent hour-long summary of the book, for those who don't have time to read the whole thing), here's a lecture he gave on the book a couple years after it was published:
In it, Menand seemingly reappraises the balance between the impact of the Civil War and Darwin's theory in response to the very last question during the Q&A (beginning at 59:20), which was about the philosophical affinities between the "classical pragmatists" and their Common Sense forebears.
Menand acknowledges these connections, but then goes on to insist:
I don't think that one should underestimate the influence that the theory of natural selection had on pragmatism as a philosophy. I really do think that that basically gave them the impetus to develop pragmatism, and the reason was (and Dewey is fairly explicit about this) [that] they felt philosophy had fallen behind science, because science was changing the world and Darwin had described a world that didn't fit traditional philosophy.Whether this is a genuine shift in Menand's understanding of the origins of American pragmatism (as the phrase "basically gave them the impetus" suggests), or whether its a subtler shift to the Civil War providing the cultural context and Darwin providing the intellectual impetus (to introduce a spurious internal/external divide at the last minute!) remains unclear.
What is clear, taking the book and the lecture as a package – and acknowledging Menand's key role in the reemergence of pragmatism (and James) in the public imagination in the last decade – is the significance of last weekend's dual birthday in the context of renewed interest in a key set of ideas at the boundary between American intellectual history and the history of science.
Senin, 13 Februari 2012
Shoot the rats, don't eat them
Margaret Humphreys will give a talk on the history of Civil War medicine on Feb. 29 at 6pm at the New York Academy of Medicine (details below).
My favorite part of her talk description is this:
Anyhow, keep reading to see Humphrey's full talk description. Via h-net.
New York Academy of Medicine’s Section on the History of Medicine and
Public Health is pleased to announce the second talk in a three-part
miniseries of lectures by prominent historians of Civil War medicine,
marking the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War.
"Of Wards and War": The Importance of Good (and Bad) Medical Care in the
American Civil War
Margaret Humphreys, MD, PhD, Duke University
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Light refreshments at 5:30 pm; lecture at 6 pm.
Location: The New York Academy of Medicine, 1216 Fifth Avenue at 103rd
Street, New York, NY 10029
During the crisis following the Haitian earthquake of 2010 one physician
commented that "we're practicing Civil War medicine here," referring to
the absence of supplies and primitive environment of care. Actually, the
well-run Civil War hospital offered superior care to that possible in
quake-ravaged Haiti. This paper will outline the components of the best
and worst of Civil War medicine, and argue that the conditions in
southern hospitals were so far inferior to those of the north that it
probably made a difference to the war effort. In the northern hospitals
men shot rats as a target practice game; in the south they roasted them
for lunch. Important aspects of the best care were nutritious food,
medicines such as chloroform, quinine, and opium, and sufficient staff
to ensure cleanliness and care of the weakened or wounded body. It is
difficult to assess hospital outcomes due the quality of the data, but
what information is available indicates that the disparities between
northern and southern hospitals were a factor in the manpower issues
that dominated the war’s final years.
Margaret Humphreys is the Josiah Charles Trent Professor in the History
of Medicine at Duke University, where she holds appointments in the
Departments of History and Medicine, and edits the Journal of the
History of Medicine. Her classes include the history of medicine, public
health, global health, and evolution. She received her PhD in the
History of Science (1983) and MD (1987) from Harvard University, and is
the author of _Yellow Fever and the South_ (Rutgers, 1992) and _Malaria:
Poverty, Race and Public Health in the United States_ (Johns Hopkins,
2001), books that explore the tropical disease environment of the
American South, and its role in the national public health effort. Her
current research concerns the impact of the Civil War on American
medicine. The first book to emerge from that project, _Intensely Human:
The Health of the Black Soldier in the American Civil War_, appeared in
2008.
To register for this event, visit
http://support.nyam.org/site/
SAVE THE DATES for the rest of the season of lectures:
~~~~~
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Hired to Care: Civil War Nurses and the Military Body
Jane E. Schultz, PhD, Indiana University-Purdue University-Indianapolis
Thursday, April 5, 2012
The Annual Friends of the Rare Book Room Lecture
Something Borrowed, Something Blue: The Strange History of Aristotle's
Masterpiece
Mary Fissell, PhD, Johns Hopkins University
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
The Lilianna Sauter Lecture
Escaping Melodramas: Historical Thinking and the Public Health Service
Studies in Tuskegee and Guatamala
Susan M. Reverby, PhD, Wellesley College
For complete descriptions of each lecture, and to register to attend,
please visit:
http://www.nyam.org/library/
Arlene Shaner
Acting Curator and Reference Librarian for Historical Collections
New York Academy of Medicine
ashaner@nyam.org
212-822-7313
Email: ashaner@nyam.org
My favorite part of her talk description is this:
In the northern hospitals men shot rats as a target practice game; in the south they roasted them for lunch. Important aspects of the best care were nutritious food, medicines such as chloroform, quinine, and opium, and sufficient staff to ensure cleanliness and care of the weakened or wounded body.Humphreys posits that the differences in medical care might have played a role in the war's outcome. I just love any framing that makes Civil War hospitals look good. Of course, I love to point to the Civil War as a good moment for American statistics too: draft and volunteer medical examinations created a data-set that was unprecedented at its time for its inclusion of so many normal or average Americans. Plus the Civil War made political space for the creation of the Land Grant Colleges, and thus paved the way for federal funding of science in the US.
Anyhow, keep reading to see Humphrey's full talk description. Via h-net.
New York Academy of Medicine’s Section on the History of Medicine and
Public Health is pleased to announce the second talk in a three-part
miniseries of lectures by prominent historians of Civil War medicine,
marking the 150th anniversary of the start of the Civil War.
"Of Wards and War": The Importance of Good (and Bad) Medical Care in the
American Civil War
Margaret Humphreys, MD, PhD, Duke University
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Light refreshments at 5:30 pm; lecture at 6 pm.
Location: The New York Academy of Medicine, 1216 Fifth Avenue at 103rd
Street, New York, NY 10029
During the crisis following the Haitian earthquake of 2010 one physician
commented that "we're practicing Civil War medicine here," referring to
the absence of supplies and primitive environment of care. Actually, the
well-run Civil War hospital offered superior care to that possible in
quake-ravaged Haiti. This paper will outline the components of the best
and worst of Civil War medicine, and argue that the conditions in
southern hospitals were so far inferior to those of the north that it
probably made a difference to the war effort. In the northern hospitals
men shot rats as a target practice game; in the south they roasted them
for lunch. Important aspects of the best care were nutritious food,
medicines such as chloroform, quinine, and opium, and sufficient staff
to ensure cleanliness and care of the weakened or wounded body. It is
difficult to assess hospital outcomes due the quality of the data, but
what information is available indicates that the disparities between
northern and southern hospitals were a factor in the manpower issues
that dominated the war’s final years.
Margaret Humphreys is the Josiah Charles Trent Professor in the History
of Medicine at Duke University, where she holds appointments in the
Departments of History and Medicine, and edits the Journal of the
History of Medicine. Her classes include the history of medicine, public
health, global health, and evolution. She received her PhD in the
History of Science (1983) and MD (1987) from Harvard University, and is
the author of _Yellow Fever and the South_ (Rutgers, 1992) and _Malaria:
Poverty, Race and Public Health in the United States_ (Johns Hopkins,
2001), books that explore the tropical disease environment of the
American South, and its role in the national public health effort. Her
current research concerns the impact of the Civil War on American
medicine. The first book to emerge from that project, _Intensely Human:
The Health of the Black Soldier in the American Civil War_, appeared in
2008.
To register for this event, visit
http://support.nyam.org/site/
SAVE THE DATES for the rest of the season of lectures:
~~~~~
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Hired to Care: Civil War Nurses and the Military Body
Jane E. Schultz, PhD, Indiana University-Purdue University-Indianapolis
Thursday, April 5, 2012
The Annual Friends of the Rare Book Room Lecture
Something Borrowed, Something Blue: The Strange History of Aristotle's
Masterpiece
Mary Fissell, PhD, Johns Hopkins University
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
The Lilianna Sauter Lecture
Escaping Melodramas: Historical Thinking and the Public Health Service
Studies in Tuskegee and Guatamala
Susan M. Reverby, PhD, Wellesley College
For complete descriptions of each lecture, and to register to attend,
please visit:
http://www.nyam.org/library/
Arlene Shaner
Acting Curator and Reference Librarian for Historical Collections
New York Academy of Medicine
ashaner@nyam.org
212-822-7313
Email: ashaner@nyam.org
Senin, 06 Februari 2012
CFP: George Perkins Marsh Conference
For your consideration---
A conference celebrating (physical geographer and other things) George Perkins Marsh: An American for all Seasons -- proposals due 15 March 2012
The College of Arts and Letters at the Stevens Institute of
Technology is pleased to announce a conference
celebrating the achievements and insights of George Perkins Marsh
(1801-1882), environmentalist, diplomat, philosopher, and scholar, to be
held on our campus 04 May 2012. Our campus-wide commitment to the
development of innovative thinking in a culture of collaboration makes
Stevens an ideal venue for sharing ideas about Marsh – a luminary figure
whose life and works connect scholar-teachers across disciplines and
cultures. Authors are invited to submit papers on any aspect of Marsh’s
many achievements or the impact of his work. A selection of papers will
be published in a volume of conference proceedings.
Please submit inquiries and papers (maximum 4,000 words) or abstracts
(250-500 words) to Lisa Dolling <ldolling@stevens.edu> and Robin
Hammerman <rhammerm@stevens.edu>.
Deadline for submissions: 15 March 2012.
------------------------
Many thanks,
Andy Russell
Assistant Professor, College of Arts & Letters
Stevens Institute of Technology
Castle Point on Hudson
Hoboken, New Jersey 07030
http://www.stevens.edu/cal/
A conference celebrating (physical geographer and other things) George Perkins Marsh: An American for all Seasons -- proposals due 15 March 2012
The College of Arts and Letters at the Stevens Institute of
Technology is pleased to announce a conference
celebrating the achievements and insights of George Perkins Marsh
(1801-1882), environmentalist, diplomat, philosopher, and scholar, to be
held on our campus 04 May 2012. Our campus-wide commitment to the
development of innovative thinking in a culture of collaboration makes
Stevens an ideal venue for sharing ideas about Marsh – a luminary figure
whose life and works connect scholar-teachers across disciplines and
cultures. Authors are invited to submit papers on any aspect of Marsh’s
many achievements or the impact of his work. A selection of papers will
be published in a volume of conference proceedings.
Please submit inquiries and papers (maximum 4,000 words) or abstracts
(250-500 words) to Lisa Dolling <ldolling@stevens.edu> and Robin
Hammerman <rhammerm@stevens.edu>.
Deadline for submissions: 15 March 2012.
------------------------
Many thanks,
Andy Russell
Assistant Professor, College of Arts & Letters
Stevens Institute of Technology
Castle Point on Hudson
Hoboken, New Jersey 07030
http://www.stevens.edu/cal/
Sabtu, 04 Februari 2012
Goodbye, Fatty! Hello, Skinny! How I Lost Weight And Still Ate The Foods I LovedWithout Dieting
Is this you? You go on a diet, you lose a little weight, you stop dieting, you gain back more weight? Do you go through an endless cycle of counting calories and watching everything you put into your mouth but nothing ever seems to work? Author, Kim Rinehart, was like this, too. After being stymied by diets that required special foods or special preparation, she finally found a way that was easy and relatively painless. One that allowed her to eat what she wanted and still lose weight. What’s even better is that she could eat cheeseburgers and french fries or whatever else she liked while doing it. It’s also so easy that anyone can do it.
Sound too good to be true? It’s not. Kim Rinehart’s memoir of weight loss, Goodbye, Fatty! Hello, Skinny! How I Lost Weight And Still Ate The Foods I Loved—Without Dieting will show how you to lose weight by simply rearranging your eating habits. This is not your ordinary weight loss book. This one actually works.
Price: $9.95
What is the best (first) book on HOS in America right now?
Know the answer? Let us know! FHSA wants to recognize a great work. Here's the official call:
The Forum for the History of Science in America has begun gathering books for its 2012 Publication Prize.
Here are the eligibility criteria:
- any book published in the English language with a publication year 2009, 2010 or 2011,
- authored by a Scholar(s) for whom this consititutes a "first book",
- on a topic in American science ("American" loosely defined to include the western hemisphere, "science" conservatively defined to exclude books focusing on either the "clinical and social history of medicine" or the "history of technology").
Authors are encouraged to self-nominate.
Please submit titles and publisher information to David Spanagel [spanagel@wpi.edu] between now and June 30, 2012. Examination copies of each nominated book must be delivered to the three (3) prize committee members by July 31, 2012 for that book to receive full consideration.
The Forum for the History of Science in America has begun gathering books for its 2012 Publication Prize.
Here are the eligibility criteria:
- any book published in the English language with a publication year 2009, 2010 or 2011,
- authored by a Scholar(s) for whom this consititutes a "first book",
- on a topic in American science ("American" loosely defined to include the western hemisphere, "science" conservatively defined to exclude books focusing on either the "clinical and social history of medicine" or the "history of technology").
Authors are encouraged to self-nominate.
Please submit titles and publisher information to David Spanagel [spanagel@wpi.edu] between now and June 30, 2012. Examination copies of each nominated book must be delivered to the three (3) prize committee members by July 31, 2012 for that book to receive full consideration.
Jumat, 03 Februari 2012
Science & US Intellectual History
According to the CFP, proposals are due 1 June and the event itself will be 1-2 November 2012. Besides the obvious attraction of Manhattan, they've got a great keynote speaker (David Hollinger) lined up – and at least the potential for interesting dialogue with history of science.
Why "potential"? Well, it was my impression last year that the focus skews strongly to twentieth-century political thought. Whether true or not of the field overall, it left the interface with the history of science mainly in the form of the social sciences relevant to that history of political ideas.
But it strikes me that there are way more ways to skin this cat, and that those who work on everything from dinosaur bones to the bomb could add to the conversation in a lot of ways – from new actors and institutions to new theoretical insights about "communities of discourse."
I talk too much about the need to get historians of science and intellectual historians thinking together, but this year's USIH conference seems like a good opportunity to collapse these two "communities of discourse" in a new way. Let's make science a bigger part of the program.
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