Geographies of Nineteenth-Century Science

edited by David N. Livingstone and Charles W. J. Withers

University of Chicago Press, 2011
Cloth: 978-0-226-48726-7 | Electronic: 978-0-226-48729-8
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.001.0001

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ABOUT THIS BOOKAUTHOR BIOGRAPHYREVIEWSTABLE OF CONTENTS

ABOUT THIS BOOK

In Geographies of Nineteenth-Century Science, David N. Livingstone and Charles W. J. Withers gather essays that deftly navigate the spaces of science in this significant period and reveal how each is embedded in wider systems of meaning, authority, and identity. Chapters from a distinguished range of contributors explore the places of creation, the paths of knowledge transmission and reception, and the import of exchange networks at various scales. Studies range from the inspection of the places of London science, which show how different scientific sites operated different moral and epistemic economies, to the scrutiny of the ways in which the museum space of the Smithsonian Institution and the expansive space of the American West produced science and framed geographical understanding. This volume makes clear that the science of this era varied in its constitution and reputation in relation to place and personnel, in its nature by virtue of its different epistemic practices, in its audiences, and in the ways in which it was put to work.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

David N. Livingstone is professor of geography and intellectual history at Queen’s University, Belfast. Charles W. J. Withers is professor of historical geography at the University of Edinburgh. They are the editors of Geography and Revolution and Geography and Enlightenment, both published by the University of Chicago Press.

REVIEWS

“The first hesitant efforts to write the geography of science addressed a point of principle: could one intelligibly say that apparently universal knowledge bore the marks of the particular places in which it was made and justified? About a quarter of a century later, the field has matured, and this more confident collection largely sets aside matters of philosophical principle in favor of a series of rich and resonant empirical inquiries about how nineteenth-century scientific knowledge traveled and how, in traveling, it was made, made authoritative, maintained, and modified. In the geography of science, these essays are state-of-the-art.”

— Steven Shapin, author of The Scientific Life

“Science with a capital S barged into the nineteenth century, elbowing aside competing knowledge-claims and laying siege to the heights of Western intellectual culture. Such a transformation had not been seen for 1,500 years, since the Roman emperor Constantine’s conversion to Christianity, and Geographies of Nineteenth-Century Science is its ground-breaking gazetteer. More encyclopedia than directory, this richly detailed work, brimful of the latest scholarship, is a cornucopia of fresh insights into where today’s mighty ‘Science’ came from in the age of its first ascendancy. Chapter by chapter, abstract ‘Science’ is disaggregated into local knowledges; spaces within places and places within spaces fall into focus like the fragments of a kaleidoscope: islands and continents, cities and farms, theaters and museums, laboratories and lecture halls, tourist guides, and textbooks, even maps. Nineteenth-century scientific knowledge came into existence to be mobilized at countless such loci, then to be amended and refined elsewhere and finally forged into ‘the view from nowhere,’ the objectivity of modern ‘Science.’ As a resource for studying this manifold process, Geographies of Nineteenth-Century Science has no peer.”

— James Moore, coauthor of Darwin’s Sacred Cause

“A rich collection of essays by some of the leading historians and historical geographers in the field, Geographies of Nineteenth-Century Science explores the diverse spatial contexts and geographical mobility of scientific knowledge during the nineteenth century. This book confirms that questions of geography—of place, space, translation, and circulation—belong at the heart of the history of science in this period.”

— Felix Driver, author of Geography Militant

“Scientific practices are developed in particular places and diffused to others, which their interpretation reflects in the local context. This excellent volume of essays illustrates that argument with a fascinating range of nineteenth-century examples that more than sustain the argument that science is a form of ‘situated knowledge.’ These essays are essential reading for all interested in the when, what, and why of scientific practices; they will be left in no doubt that ‘where’ is just as important.”

— Ron Johnston, author of Geography and Geographers

“As a whole the volume represents an important contribution to a flourishing field in the history of science that the two editors of this collection over the last two decades have done much to develop and influence.”

— Casper Andersen, British Journal for the History of Science

“This exciting interdisciplinary collection of essays in a competitively priced, elegant volume will appeal to academics, students, and general readers. It amply succeeds in exploring the multifarious spatial contexts and demonstrating the geographical mobility of scientific knowledge, strongly re-asserting that geographies of ‘place, space, translation, and circulation’ must be at the forefront of our understanding of nineteenth-century science and scientific culture.”

— Paul Elliott, University of Derby, Journal of Historical Geography

“Livingstone and Withers’s volume showcases the wide and fertile ground being ploughed by historical geographers, science studies scholars, and historians of science. In examining the diffuse spaces and the multiple forms of scientific knowledge, and in attending to the performative and situated character of its production and reception, Geographies of Nineteenth-Century Science speaks to recent work on technologies of the self, urban studies, and the history of the book. It deserves to be read widely by scholars of the Victorian period.”

— Tamson Pietsch, Brunel University, Victorian Studies

Acknowledgments

Thinking Geographically about Nineteenth-Century Science - Charles W. J. Withers, David N. Livingstone
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0001
[science, nineteenth century, meaning, identity, authority, organizational structures, taxonomies, geography of science]
This chapter discusses the theme of this volume which is about the geographical aspects or dimensions of science in the nineteenth century. The essays in this volume reveal the remarkable range of sites in which scientific concerns have been engaged, all of which are mappable locations embedded in wider systems of meaning, identity and authority. This volume also considers various proposals with regard to the organizational structures and conceptual taxonomies involved in understanding the geography of science. (pages 1 - 19)
This chapter is available at:
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Part One: Sites and Scales

Refashioning the Spaces of London Science: Elite Epistemes in the Nineteenth Century - Bernard Lightman
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0002
[science, London, England, scientific sites, moral economies, epistemic economies, Joseph Banks, British Association for the Advancement of Science, aristocratic privilege, scientific naturalism]
This chapter offers a survey of several sites for science in London, England. The analysis reveals how different scientific sites operated different moral and epistemic economies like the privileged venues patronized by figures like Joseph Banks and those occupied by the British Association for the Advancement of Science. These sites were not simply physical locations, but symbolic urban places whose occupants were aligned for or against aristocratic privilege, radical reform, or scientific naturalism. (pages 25 - 50)
This chapter is available at:
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The Status of Museums: Authority, Identity, and Material Culture - Samuel J. M. M. Alberti
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0003
[museums, scientific sites, knowledge, curatorial credibility, identity, object epistemology, cognitive authority, museum space]
This chapter examines the status of museums as scientific sites. It argues that museums achieved their privileged status as places and sites of knowledge from a combination of practitioners' curatorial credibility, authority and expertise. This chapter also shows how museum space was routinely implicated in questions rotating around identity, authority, and what is sometimes called object epistemology and explains the role of physical objects and their location within museum space in the negotiation of cognitive authority. (pages 51 - 72)
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Cultivating Genetics in the Country: Whittingehame Lodge, Cambridge - Donald L. Opitz
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0004
[experimental testing, country houses, Cambridge, England, genetics, Great Britain, Whittingehame Lodge, university]
This chapter examines experimental testing in country houses in Cambridge, England. It highlights the role of country house in the early history of genetics in Great Britain during the decades around 1900. This chapter discusses the history of the Whittingehame Lodge and suggests that nature of the science of genetics in Cambridge was determined replication at a smaller scale of distinctive and separate experimental spaces for doing such science beyond the university. (pages 73 - 98)
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Scale and the Geographies of Civic Science: Practice and Experience in the Meetings of the British Association for the Advancement of Science in Britain and in Ireland, c. 1845–1900 - Charles W. J. Withers
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0005
[British Association for the Advancement of Science, BAAS, civic science, towns, cities, Great Britain, Ireland, public good, scientific neutrality, political neutrality]
This chapter examines the towns and cities in Ireland and Great Britain that served temporary venues for associational civic science for the British Association for the Advancement of Science (BAAS). The analysis shows how a national policy of being provincial was given local inflection through different practices in demonstrating and displaying the scientific credentials of the host venue and the status of the science. This chapter discusses the BAAS' promotion of science a public good, a unifying, moral vision under the banner of scientific and political neutrality. (pages 99 - 122)
This chapter is available at:
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Islanded: Natural History in the British Colonization of Ceylon - Sujit Sivasundaram
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0006
[Ceylon, scientific site, symbolic geography, British natural history, natural knowledge, Kandyans, Buddhist temples, topography]
This chapter examines the symbolic geography of Ceylon as a scientific site. It suggests that the scale of inquiry in Ceylon included the ways in which nineteenth-century networks of colonial understanding about that island could not be separated from questions about the physical topography of the island itself. This chapter also contends that the twin topography of Ceylon and their long-standing iconic associations were constitutive of relations between British natural history and the natural knowledge that Kandyans cultivated around Buddhist temples. (pages 123 - 148)
This chapter is available at:
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Part Two: Practices and Performances

Placing Science in an Age of Oratory: Spaces of Scientific Speech in Mid-Victorian Edinburgh - Diarmid A. Finnegan
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0007
[scientific speeches, Music Hall, Edinburgh, Scotland, Edinburgh Philosophical Institution, scientific knowledge]
This chapter examines the role of the Music Hall in Edinburgh, Scotland as the scientific speech venue of the Edinburgh Philosophical Institution. It discusses the role of speeches in spreading scientific knowledge and explains that speeches at the Music Hall were regulated to ensure that science was delivered appropriately. This chapter also shows that not every speaker at the Music Hall illuminated science's mysteries through verbal artistry and those that did were sometimes received and interpreted in different ways. (pages 153 - 177)
This chapter is available at:
University of Chicago Press
https://academic.oup.com/chica...

Politics, Culture, and Human Origins: Geographies of Reading and Reputation in Nineteenth-Century Science - David N. Livingstone
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0008
[scientists, nineteenth century, science, geographical aspects, reputation, Isaac La Peyrère, Charles Darwin]
This chapter examines geographical aspects of the interpretation and reputation of scientists in the nineteenth century. It describes the different readings and reputations of proto-anthropological thinker Isaac La Peyrère and Charles Darwin. This chapter suggests that it is important to closely examine the relationships between how and where ideas were read, and by whom in order to understand the ways in which science moved over space. (pages 178 - 202)
This chapter is available at:
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Electricity and the Sociable Circulation of Fear and Fearlessness - Graeme Gooday
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0009
[safety, electricity, public spaces, moral panics, technical concerns, Crystal Palace, theaters, London, scientific testing]
This chapter examines the demonstration of the safety of electricity in public spaces. It explains that the moral panics and technical concerns about electricity necessitated its public testing in the home and on the theatrical stage, particularly in Crystal Palace and London's theatres. This chapter highlights the intimate connections between space and scientific testing and explains that the practice of electrical safety had to be seen to be believed at other social, personal, and instrumental scales for it underlay developments in physics and engineering. (pages 203 - 228)
This chapter is available at:
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“The ‘Crinoline’ of Our Steam Engineers”: Reinventing the Marine Compound Engine, 1850–1885 - Crosbie Smith
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0010
[engine technology, steam engine, public testing, steamships, trial by space, technological innovations, power, time trials]
This chapter examines public testing of engine technology and advances in the use of high-pressure steam for power during the period from 1850 to 1885. It provides an account of how steamships and their builders were subjected to the so-called trial by space. This chapter describes the various time trials that Victorian steamships underwent, the technological innovations that were involved and the debates surrounding how the trials were witnessed. (pages 229 - 254)
This chapter is available at:
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Expeditionary Science: Conflicts of Method in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Geographical Discovery - Lawrence Dritsas
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0011
[expeditionary science, nineteenth century, England, geographical discovery, Central African Lakes, critical geography, scientific knowledge, authority]
This chapter examines the conflicts in method of mid-nineteenth century expeditionary science in England, focusing on the geographical discovery of the Central African Lakes. It highlights the tensions between those who had direct experience of foreign lands and the claims of those engaged in the so-called critical geography. This chapter also suggests that different routes to scientific knowledge could be employed and that different reputations for authority could be made or broken in relation to which methods had been practiced in securing what knowledge. (pages 255 - 273)
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Part Three: Guides and Audiences

Pressed into Service: Specimens, Space, and Seeing in Botanical Practice - Anne Secord
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0012
[botanical knowledge, texts, scientific observation, books, visual habits, textual space, visual skills, scientific expertise]
This chapter examines the transference of botanical knowledge between the field and the cabinet in ways that centered upon texts as guides. It explains the production of scientific observation in the botanical world demanded that books should discipline visual habits and that the spaces of the book illustrate not just the products of observation, but also its processes. This chapter highlights the role of textual space in the honing of visual skills and clarifies some of the key mechanisms in the circulation of scientific expertise. (pages 283 - 310)
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Science, Print, and Crossing Borders: Importing French Science Books into Britain, 1789–1815 - Jonathan R. Topham
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0013
[knowledge in transit, scientific knowledge, borders, Laplace, physics, Lavoisier, chemistry, Lamarck, natural history]
This chapter examines the idea of knowledge in transit and on the ways in which printed matter crossed borders. It analyzes several cases studies including Laplace's physics, Lavoisier's chemistry and Lamarck's natural history and shows that the circulation of scientific knowledge was critically dependent upon the mediation of others between author and audience. This chapter also discusses the several interlinking geographies that are operating in the flow of scientific knowledge. (pages 311 - 344)
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Geological Mapping and the Geographies of Proprietorship in Nineteenth-Century Cornwall - Simon Naylor
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0014
[cartographiy, territorial acquisition, geological mapping, geologists, Cornwall, England, visual technology, Royal Geological Society, maps, geology]
This chapter explains how the cartographic enterprise can be read as a “form of territorial acquisition” on the part of mapping geologists, focusing the mapping of geology of Cornwall, England. It highlights the importance of maps spatial instruments and as a visual language and as an important tool in the “visual technology” of the natural sciences. This chapter explains that survey of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall depended on the reductive visual authority of the map as a guide to what could and could not be seen. (pages 345 - 370)
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Natural History and the Victorian Tourist: From Landscapes to Rock-Pools - Aileen Fyfe
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0015
[tourism guidebooks, handbooks, Victorian England, science, artistic illustration, photographic reproduction, scientific culture, geology, natural history, antiquities]
This chapter examines the scientific values of tourism guidebooks and handbooks in Victorian England. It shows the connection among locality, textuality and visualization in popular encounters with science during this period. This chapter highlights the role of artistic illustration, photographic reproduction, and viewer discipline in the development of nineteenth-century scientific culture and explains how guidebooks present the scientific merits of regions or places through a carefully ordered textual sequence of geology, natural history, antiquities, notable features and the like. (pages 371 - 398)
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Place and Museum Space: The Smithsonian Institution, National Identity, and the American West, 1846–1896 - Sally Gregory Kohlstedt
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0016
[American West, Smithsonian Institution, American psyche, museum space, nation, symbolic role, museum, expeditions, observations, textual guides]
This chapter examines the connection between the museum space of the Smithsonian Institution and the expansive space of the American West. It explains that the symbolic role of the West in the American psyche emerged in significant part from its staging within the confines of the Smithsonian Institution and that the museum contributed to public instantiation of the idea of the American West not as a fixed place, but as a reflection of the nation itself. This chapter suggests that the museum provided its visitors an experience of the West with its collection of products of expeditions, managed observations and accumulated textual guides. (pages 399 - 438)
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Afterword Putting the Geography of Science in Its Place - Nicolaas Rupke
DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226487298.003.0017
[geography of science, nineteenth century, spatialist approach, Alexander von Humboldt, Carl Ritter, Alphonse de Candolle, history of science]
This chapter examines the spatialist approach in relation to the geographies of science in the nineteenth century. It discusses the spatial turn in the history of science and analyzes several relevant studies including those of Alexander von Humboldt, Carl Ritter and Alphonse de Candolle. This chapter suggests that the sites and spaces identified in this volume are not merely realities “out there” that we discover and record, but are assignments of place by historians that reflect our place and serve to instrumentalize the prestige of science for a range of self-serving purposes. (pages 439 - 454)
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Bibliography

Contributors

Index