26th April 2018
The Linnean Society of London
Registration Now Open - see here
This day meeting marks the tercentenary of the death of James Petiver FRS, an important but often overlooked professional apothecary and compulsive natural historian in 18th-century London. Petiver made significant contributions to multiple fields of natural history, above all botany and entomology. An assiduous correspondent and collector, he successfully cultivated sources of natural historical intelligence and material from the Americas to the East Indies.
Speakers will assess Petiver's life and legacy by deploying a range of historical and scientific disciplinary perspectives. On the 300th anniversary of his death, the meeting will set out to remember James Petiver:
• as a practising natural historian of substantial abilities and merit
• as a collector and cataloguer of natural historical specimens with enduring significance
• as a writer of both manuscript correspondence and published natural historical texts
• as an apothecary whose professional and private scientific interests mutually informed each other
• as a social networker both within London and across the globe
• as an historical figure whose legacy has been contested and which is ripe for reconsideration
Speakers: Dr Arnold Hunt, Dr Charles E Jarvis FLS, Sebestian Kroupa, Dr Alice Marples, Katrina Maydom, Professor Kathleen S Murphy, Dr Victoria Pickering, Professor Richard Vane-Wright FLS. Respondent: Dr Emma Spary.
Organisers: Richard Coulton, Charlie Jarvis.
Showing posts with label Insects. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Insects. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 17, 2018
Sunday, September 10, 2017
Tuesday, June 21, 2016
Victorian insects - blog
An essay by Franziska Kohlt about how nineteenth century Britain became obsessed with insects is online here in honour of National Insect Week. (We missed Save the Frogs Day...)
Tuesday, June 10, 2014
Recap - Entomological Adventures
Many thanks to everyone who came along and contributed to last night's discussion! Building on the previous meeting, we continued to talk about children's natural history books, and saw the academic year out in style with suitably entomological refreshments.
The introduction and subsequent conversation touched on many crucial themes for literature and science scholarship, from anecdote, antagonists, and autobiography, to childhood and colonialism, objectivity and observation, changes of scale and moments of wonder. We thought about these works in relation to the contemporary rise of Nature Study in Britain and American, situating the pond-dipping anecdotes of Fabre, in particular, against attempts to teach children through 'Nature, not books', and against other attempts such as the Boy Scout movement to engage young groups with their surrounding worlds. We considered Fabre's work as a nostalgic piece of writing, looking back on his earliest natural historical experiences, and characteristic of his particular blend of the personal and informal with the scientifically-specific, as - for instance - when he pulled focus at the end of the 'pond' chapter to consider the planet as a whole. What connections could we draw, we wondered, to the development of ecological and ethological sciences? We also analysed Madalene and Louisa as a work of the 1980s, looking back at the Victorian period: its connections to nineteenth-century domestic practices of watercolours, scapbooks, and Brontesque juvenilia, as well as to comic journalism and - back in the twentieth century - graphic novels; the surprising, perhaps, subversion of the received view of dour Victorian childhood.
Many thanks to Daniel for alerting us to the existence of Maya the bee and her own Adventures: there is a 1922 English translation (with beautiful illustrations) available here.
See below for some photos of the group in action, of some of the texts we looked at, and - of course - of the creepy-crawly catering.
The introduction and subsequent conversation touched on many crucial themes for literature and science scholarship, from anecdote, antagonists, and autobiography, to childhood and colonialism, objectivity and observation, changes of scale and moments of wonder. We thought about these works in relation to the contemporary rise of Nature Study in Britain and American, situating the pond-dipping anecdotes of Fabre, in particular, against attempts to teach children through 'Nature, not books', and against other attempts such as the Boy Scout movement to engage young groups with their surrounding worlds. We considered Fabre's work as a nostalgic piece of writing, looking back on his earliest natural historical experiences, and characteristic of his particular blend of the personal and informal with the scientifically-specific, as - for instance - when he pulled focus at the end of the 'pond' chapter to consider the planet as a whole. What connections could we draw, we wondered, to the development of ecological and ethological sciences? We also analysed Madalene and Louisa as a work of the 1980s, looking back at the Victorian period: its connections to nineteenth-century domestic practices of watercolours, scapbooks, and Brontesque juvenilia, as well as to comic journalism and - back in the twentieth century - graphic novels; the surprising, perhaps, subversion of the received view of dour Victorian childhood.
Many thanks to Daniel for alerting us to the existence of Maya the bee and her own Adventures: there is a 1922 English translation (with beautiful illustrations) available here.
See below for some photos of the group in action, of some of the texts we looked at, and - of course - of the creepy-crawly catering.
Tuesday, May 13, 2014
Entomological Adventures - further reading
A few additional items of interest for our meeting on 9th June:
- Charlotte Sleigh on Fabre in the BSHS Travel Guide: 'Insect souvenirs in Provence'.
- A website dedicated to Fabre.
- An article about a 2009 exhibition of Madalene and Louisa Pasley's drawings.
- Rare entomology books, and a video about Fabre, from Abe Books.
9th June - Entomological Adventures
Our second meeting of Easter Term 2014 looks at introductory entomology. We meet from 7.30-9pm in the Godwin Room at Clare College. Links to the readings can be found below: those not online are in the Whipple Library box file. We hope to see you there!
- The Adventures of Madalene and Louisa: pages from the album of L. and M.S. Pasley, Victorian entomologists.
- Alexander Teixeira de Mattos, The Life of the Fly... by J. Henri Fabre (1913). Read chapter 7, 'The Pond', but feel free to skim the rest of the book as well.
- Louise Seymour Hasbrouck, Insect Adventures by J. Henri Fabre (1917). Read the preface and chapter 1 ('My First Pond'). Feel free to skim the rest of the book.
Monday, April 14, 2014
Easter Term 2014
Science for Children
This term we explore how scientific texts have been rewritten for juvenile audiences in the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries, as well as analysing a work written by two young people themselves. We meet on Mondays from 7.30 to 9pm in the Godwin Room at Clare College (Old Court).Organised by Julie Barzilay (HPS), and Melanie Keene (Homerton College): please contact us if you would like to join the mailing list. Copies of readings not available online will be put in the Science and Literature Reading Group box file in the Whipple Library. All welcome!
12 May: What Mr Darwin Saw
- Charles Darwin, Journal of researches into the natural history and geology of the countries visited during the voyage of H.M.S. Beagle round the world (1845 edn). Read the preface and chapter 1 (Porto Praya).
- Wendell Phillips Garrison, What Mr. Darwin Saw in His Voyage Round the World in the ship 'Beagle' (1879). Read the introduction for parents, introduction for children, pages 29–33 in Part I ('The Horse') and pages 92–104 in Part II ('Man'). Feel free to skim the rest of the book.
- Mick Manning and Brita Granström, What Mr Darwin Saw (2009).
9 June: Entomological adventures
- The Adventures of Madalene and Louisa: pages from the album of L. and M.S. Pasley, Victorian entomologists.
- Alexander Teixeira de Mattos, The Life of the Fly... by J. Henri Fabre (1913). Read chapter 7, 'The Pond', but feel free to skim the rest of the book as well.
- Louise Seymour Hasbrouck, Insect Adventures by J. Henri Fabre (1917). Read the preface and chapter 1 ('My First Pond'). Feel free to skim the rest of the book.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
17th May - Insects
We meet, as usual, from 7.30-9pm in the Skillicorn Room at Homerton College. The modified reading list is all online, with links below:
‘A Lesson of Faith’ and ‘Knowledge not the Limit of Belief’, Margaret Gatty, Parables From Nature (1855-)
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