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Geographies of Knowledge

Science, Scale, and Spatiality in the Nineteenth Century

edited by Robert J. Mayhew and Charles W. J. Withers

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A path-breaking exploration of how space, place, and scale influenced the production and circulation of scientific knowledge in the nineteenth century.

Over the past twenty years, scholars have increasingly questioned not just historical presumptions about the putative rise of modern science during the long nineteenth century but also the geographical contexts for and variability of science during the era. In Geographies of Knowledge, an internationally distinguished array of historians and geographers examine the spatialization of science in the period, tracing the ways in which scale and...

A path-breaking exploration of how space, place, and scale influenced the production and circulation of scientific knowledge in the nineteenth century.

Over the past twenty years, scholars have increasingly questioned not just historical presumptions about the putative rise of modern science during the long nineteenth century but also the geographical contexts for and variability of science during the era. In Geographies of Knowledge, an internationally distinguished array of historians and geographers examine the spatialization of science in the period, tracing the ways in which scale and space are crucial to understanding the production, dissemination, and reception of scientific knowledge in the nineteenth century.

Engaging with and extending the influential work of David Livingstone and others on science's spatial dimensions, the book touches on themes of empire, gender, religion, Darwinism, and much more. In exploring the practice of science across four continents, these essays illuminate the importance of geographical perspectives to the study of science and knowledge, and how these ideas made and contested locally could travel the globe.

Dealing with everything from the local spaces of the Surrey countryside to the global negotiations that proposed a single prime meridian, from imperial knowledge creation and exploration in Burma, India, and Africa to studies of metropolitan scientific-cum-theological tussles in Belfast and in Confederate America, Geographies of Knowledge outlines an interdisciplinary agenda for the study of science as geographically situated sets of practices in the era of its modern disciplinary construction. More than that, it outlines new possibilities for all those interested in knowledge's spatial characteristics in other periods.

Contributors: John A. Agnew, Vinita Damodaran, Diarmid A. Finnegan, Nuala C. Johnson, Dane Kennedy, Robert J. Mayhew, Mark Noll, Ronald L. Numbers, Nicolaas Rupke, Yvonne Sherratt, Charles W. J. Withers

Reviews

Reviews

To geographers of science and historians of science interested in space, Geographies of Knowledge will prove useful, though perhaps not paradigm shifting.

While this volume pays tribute to the work of David Livingstone, the intention of this collection of essays is also to challenge and extend his work and to develop new understandings of the spatiality of science during the long nineteenth century.

An original and substantial contribution to the study of science and place. Each engaging chapter sheds light on another aspect of the topic. The volume covers a lot of ground, from the social sciences to the natural sciences. The book will be of interest to historical geographers and historians of science, as well as to graduate students and advanced undergraduates.

This collection of uniformly excellent essays brings together a really impressive set of historians and geographers.

Geographies of Knowledge shows us how, what, why, and most importantly where nineteenth-century science was imagined, tested, lived, and challenged. We are in the company of the world's most exciting historical geographers.

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Book Details

Publication Date
Status
Available
Trim Size
6
x
9
Pages
272
ISBN
9781421438542
Illustration Description
4 halftones
Table of Contents

Contributors
Preface
Introduction: Thinking Geographically about Science in the Nineteenth Century
Part I. Locale Studies
1. Locating Malthus's Essay: Localism and the Construction of Social Science, 1798

Contributors
Preface
Introduction: Thinking Geographically about Science in the Nineteenth Century
Part I. Locale Studies
1. Locating Malthus's Essay: Localism and the Construction of Social Science, 1798-1826
2. Revisiting Belfast: Tyndall, Science, and the Plurality of Place
Part II. National Studies
3. Henry Hotze in Place: Religion, Science, Confederate Propaganda, and Race
4. "Made in America": The Politics of Place in Debates over Science and Religion
5. Putting the Structuralist Theory of Evolution in Its Place
Part III. Global Studies
6. Science, Sites, and Situated Practice: Debating the Prime Meridian in the International Geographical Congress, 1871-1904
7. Illustrating Nature: Exploration, Natural History, and the Travels of Charlotte Wheeler-Cuffe in Burma
8. Climate, Environment, and the Colonial Experience
9. Lost in Place: Two Expeditions Gone Awry in Africa
Afterword
Index

Author Bios
Featured Contributor

Robert J. Mayhew

Robert J. Mayhew is a professor of historical geography and intellectual history at the University of Bristol. He is the author of Malthus: The Life and Legacies of an Untimely Prophet.
Featured Contributor

Charles W. J. Withers

Charles W. J. Withers is professor emeritus at the University of Edinburgh and Geographer Royal for Scotland. He is the author of Zero Degrees: Geographies of the Prime Meridian.