Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Royal Society @ 350
Details of the literary events planned as part of the Royal Society's 350th anniversary celebrations on the South Bank next week can be found here. They include appearances by Jocelyn Bell-Burnell and Jamie McKendrick, Gabriel Weston, Adam Foulds and Samantha Harvey, a discussion on science fiction, and a family poetry workshop.
William Henry Fox Talbot: Beyond Photography - Exhibition at Trinity College
The Wren Library is open to visitors from 12.00 until 2.00, Monday to Friday.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Fairy Tale Physics: Myths and Legends Explained
See here for a 2005 National Geographic article about an Australian initiative.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Once upon a time in the land of chemistry...
See here for 'a case for fantasy writing in chemistry'.
Scientizing the Other: Science, Medicine and the Study of Human Difference, 1800-1950
A one-day international postgraduate student conference to be held at Churchill College, University of Cambridge
Tuesday, 22 June 2010
For the last two hundred years, members of the scientific and medical establishments have represented and misrepresented peoples of different class, sex, race, age and ability in their efforts to chart human variation. This conference will explore how science has been used to evaluate the ‘other’ in society, and will examine the various means by which seemingly objective conclusions were reached concerning whole segments of the population.
Papers given will include:
- Yoshiya Makita (Hitotsubashi University): ‘Institutionalizing the Disabled Other: Social Policy over the ‘Feeble-Minded’ in the United States and Japan and the Turn of the Twentieth Century’
- Amir Teicher (Tel-Aviv University): ‘Identity, Purity and Otherness in the Praxis of Genealogical Tree Formation in Germany, 1900-1936’
- Jenny Bangham (University of Cambridge): ‘The blood groups of the Basques: constructing a new anthropological tool, 1945-1960’
- Christina Wu (Écoles des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales): ‘Diagnosing Passion in the Tropics: ‘Amok’ and Colonial Classification in British Malaya’
- Fenneke Sysling (VU University Amsterdam): ‘Between Data and Experience: Physical Anthropology in the Dutch Indies, 1890s-1920s’
- Jed Foland (University of Oxford): ‘Women’s Colleges and the Pursuit of Eugenics in the United States, 1910-1930’
- Clare Tebutt (University of Manchester): ‘Male/Female/Other: 1930s Intersex Research and its Popular dissemination’
- Howard H. Chiang (Princeton University): ‘How to Do the History of Transsexuality in China’
Registration is free and the event begins at 9am
Thursday, June 10, 2010
New Fairy Tales - online magazine
Monday, June 07, 2010
Play - Blooming Snapdragons at the Royal Institution
Wednesday 14 July 2010, 7.00pm-8.30pm
100 years ago was an exciting time of discovery in the newly developing science of genetics. Mankind was starting to uncover the very building blocks of life and what makes us, but what about womankind? This was a time when women couldn’t receive degrees on completing their exams, and women’s colleges had to fund their own laboratories as male scientists wouldn’t let them complete practical work in their labs. And yet, the early work in this new field of genetics is filled with the names of women scientists.
Now, a new play is bringing these names to life to explore their dedication and their contribution against a backdrop of exclusion from the mainstream scientific community.
‘Blooming Snapdragons’, written and performed by Liz Rothschild and Syreeta Kumar, tells the story of a remarkable group of scientists, known collectively as Bateson’s Ladies, whose contribution to the first steps into the vast new territory of genetics is marked through their scientific achievements, whilst little is known of them as people. It explores their preclusion from the male dominated laboratories of universities and their relationship with William Bateson, who coined the word ‘genetics’ but was himself a marginalised figure in academic society.
William Bateson was the first director of the John Innes Institute, an organisation that is celebrating its centenary this year, and it through researching material for the centenary celebrations that much of the groundbreaking work of these remarkable ladies has come to light, and prompted the modern day John Innes Centre to commission a play to tell their stories.
“It has been a fascinating journey into this period of scientific history so relevant to the work being done today and a rare privilege to be invited, as a writer with no scientific background, into the everyday world of laboratories and glasshouses,” commented Liz Rothschild.
‘Blooming Snapdragons’ takes place in a contemporary laboratory as two scientists explore the lost story of these women. Playing a series of female scientists from the past, they examine the controversy around educating women and how their careers developed, whilst one of them wrestles with her own personal challenges today.
“As a person who found science subjects difficult and even boring at school it has been fascinating to explore the beauty and bravery of the work of Bateson’s Ladies and I hope it will kindle in those watching a curiosity and respect for the questions and challenges facing science now,” said Liz.
‘Blooming Snapdragons’ is directed by Sue Mayo and will be followed by a panel discussion with Sue and the cast about the issues raised.
Now, a new play is bringing these names to life to explore their dedication and their contribution against a backdrop of exclusion from the mainstream scientific community.
‘Blooming Snapdragons’, written and performed by Liz Rothschild and Syreeta Kumar, tells the story of a remarkable group of scientists, known collectively as Bateson’s Ladies, whose contribution to the first steps into the vast new territory of genetics is marked through their scientific achievements, whilst little is known of them as people. It explores their preclusion from the male dominated laboratories of universities and their relationship with William Bateson, who coined the word ‘genetics’ but was himself a marginalised figure in academic society.
William Bateson was the first director of the John Innes Institute, an organisation that is celebrating its centenary this year, and it through researching material for the centenary celebrations that much of the groundbreaking work of these remarkable ladies has come to light, and prompted the modern day John Innes Centre to commission a play to tell their stories.
“It has been a fascinating journey into this period of scientific history so relevant to the work being done today and a rare privilege to be invited, as a writer with no scientific background, into the everyday world of laboratories and glasshouses,” commented Liz Rothschild.
‘Blooming Snapdragons’ takes place in a contemporary laboratory as two scientists explore the lost story of these women. Playing a series of female scientists from the past, they examine the controversy around educating women and how their careers developed, whilst one of them wrestles with her own personal challenges today.
“As a person who found science subjects difficult and even boring at school it has been fascinating to explore the beauty and bravery of the work of Bateson’s Ladies and I hope it will kindle in those watching a curiosity and respect for the questions and challenges facing science now,” said Liz.
‘Blooming Snapdragons’ is directed by Sue Mayo and will be followed by a panel discussion with Sue and the cast about the issues raised.
Tickets cost £8 standard, £6 concessions, £4 Ri Members.
To book tickets go to http://www.rigb.org/contentControl?action=displayEvent&id=1004
John Tyndall Correspondence Symposium, Thursday 24th June 2010, University of Leeds
This is a one-day symposium to bring together any researchers interested in the life, letters and works of nineteenth-century physicist and lecturer John Tyndall, and to discuss the international project to transcribe his correspondence.
Registration for the symposium is £5, which is payable on the day. As numbers are limited, if you would like to attend please contact Mike Finn (email: ph07maf@leeds.ac.uk ) by Friday 18th June.
Details of the event should soon be available at http://www.hps.leeds.ac.uk/News/index.htm, but in the meantime the programme is also viewable at http://www.personal.leeds.ac.uk/~ph07maf/tyndall.htm and in outline below:
Outline Programme:
09:30 Arrivals & Registration
10:00 Introduction by Graeme Gooday (University of Leeds)
10:10 Session 1
Michael Reidy (Montana State University)
“Bringing Science to the Humanities: The John Tyndall Correspondence Project”
James Elwick (York University, Toronto)
“Transcribing Tyndall, or, how to make Collaborative Academic Networks more than just a Buzzphrase”
11:30 Session 2
Graeme Gooday & Jamie Stark (University of Leeds)
“John Tyndall: Lecturing, Authority and Correspondence in Victorian Public Science”
Mike Finn (University of Leeds)
“Following Your Example at a Distance: The Carlylean Balancing of John Tyndall & James Crichton-Browne”
Michael Reidy (Montana State University)
“John Tyndall’s Vertical Physics”
Lunch
14:00: Session 3
Frank James (Royal Institution of Great Britain)
“Father, Son, Brother, Colleague? Michael Faraday and John Tyndall”
Bernard Lightman (York University, Toronto)
“Tyndall and Patronage”
Wine Reception to close
This event has been generously supported by:
The Leeds Humanities Research Institute, The Wellcome Trust and the Royal Historical Society
Registration for the symposium is £5, which is payable on the day. As numbers are limited, if you would like to attend please contact Mike Finn (email: ph07maf@leeds.ac.uk ) by Friday 18th June.
Details of the event should soon be available at http://www.hps.leeds.ac.uk/News/index.htm, but in the meantime the programme is also viewable at http://www.personal.leeds.ac.uk/~ph07maf/tyndall.htm and in outline below:
Outline Programme:
09:30 Arrivals & Registration
10:00 Introduction by Graeme Gooday (University of Leeds)
10:10 Session 1
Michael Reidy (Montana State University)
“Bringing Science to the Humanities: The John Tyndall Correspondence Project”
James Elwick (York University, Toronto)
“Transcribing Tyndall, or, how to make Collaborative Academic Networks more than just a Buzzphrase”
11:30 Session 2
Graeme Gooday & Jamie Stark (University of Leeds)
“John Tyndall: Lecturing, Authority and Correspondence in Victorian Public Science”
Mike Finn (University of Leeds)
“Following Your Example at a Distance: The Carlylean Balancing of John Tyndall & James Crichton-Browne”
Michael Reidy (Montana State University)
“John Tyndall’s Vertical Physics”
Lunch
14:00: Session 3
Frank James (Royal Institution of Great Britain)
“Father, Son, Brother, Colleague? Michael Faraday and John Tyndall”
Bernard Lightman (York University, Toronto)
“Tyndall and Patronage”
Wine Reception to close
This event has been generously supported by:
The Leeds Humanities Research Institute, The Wellcome Trust and the Royal Historical Society
CONFERENCE UPDATE: Reweaving the Rainbow: Literature & Philosophy, 1850-1910
Registration is now open. Details of this and of the draft conference programme can be found at http://sall.exeter.ac.uk/research/conferences/reweavingtherainbow/
Any enquiries, please get in touch! k.hext@ex.ac.uk
Provisional Programme
Friday 10th September
11.00-12.30: Registration (Refreshments and a light lunch will be served)
12.30-12.45: Welcome
12.45-14.00: Keynote Speaker: Prof. Michael Wood (Princeton), Title TBC
Chair: Prof. Regenia Gagnier (Exeter)
14.00-14.30: Coffee/tea
14.30-16.00: Parallel Panels 1
A: Aesthetics
Thomas Karshan (Queen Mary, London), On Free Play in Literature and Aesthetics, 1850-1910
David Taylor (Roehampton), Art … A Priestly Function
Patricia Zakreski (Exeter), The Philosophy of Design and the Art of Fiction
B: Science
Andrew Mangham (Reading), Dickens, Medicine and the Philosophy of Science
Philipp Erchinger (Exeter), Knowing How to Guess: Darwin’s Hypotheses, Kepler’s Discoveries, and the Relationship between Science and Art
Louise Lee (King's College, London), 'A Mouth at the Top': Nonsense-world Physiognomy and the Respatialisation of the Face in Lewis Carroll and Charles Darwin
16.00-17.30: Parallel Panels 2
A: The Fin de Siècle
Regenia Gagnier (Exeter), Title TBC
Michael Bell (Warwick), Myth, Literature and Modernity: A Question of Priority
Sara Crangle (Sussex), Fin-de-Siècle Laughters
B: Form and Composition
Martin Simonson (University of the Basque Country), Henry David Thoreau and Edward Thomas: The Aesthetics of Walking
Demelza Hookway (Exeter), 'What John Stuart Mill Saw': Mona Caird’s Dialogue with Mill Cumhur Yılmaz Madran (Pamukkale University), Existentialism Displayed in Conrad’s Lord Jim
17.30-18.30: Wine Reception (kindly sponsored by Pirongs Educational Publishers)
19.30 onwards: Gala Dinner (Holland Hall, University of Exeter)
_________________________________________________________
Saturday 11th September
09.30-11.00: Parallel Panels 3
A: Poetry As Philosophy
Marion Thain (Birmingham), Phenomenology and Lyric Form
Karen Simecek (Warwick), The Experience of Poetry and its Role in Philosophical Inquiry
Nour Aweti (Leicester), The Poetical Philosophy of Constance Naden
Conor Carville (Reading) & Michael Halewood (Essex), Whitehead, Poetry and the Bifurcation of Nature
B: Philosophy through Fiction
David R. Sorensen (Saint Joseph's University), 'An Indefinable, Tentative Process': Carlyle, George Eliot, and the Redemption of Philosophy Through History and Fiction
Peter Rawlings (UWE), Henry James, What Maisie Knew, and Epistemology
Julian Wolfreys (Loughborough), Is There a Philosophy in This Text: Epistemological Countersignatures and Traces in Literature of the Nineteenth Century
11.00-12.30: Parallel Panels 4
A: Ralph Waldo Emerson and George Santayana
David M. Robinson (Oregon State), Emerson, Empiricism, and 'The Natural Method of Mental Philosophy'
David Greenham (UWE), Emerson Among The Philosophers
Ricardo Miguel-Alfonso (Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha), No More Barbaric Yawps: George Santayana and the Problem of Modern Poetry
B: Walter Pater: Rewriting Discourse and Identity
Kit Andrews (Western Oregon) The Essay as Philosophical-Literary Form: Pater’s Plato and Platonism
Adam Lee (Jesus College, Oxford) Platonism in Walter Pater’s The Renaissance
Sarah Townley (Nottingham). 'A Certain Kind of Temperament': Walter Pater and the Art of Individualism
12.30-13.30: Lunch
13.30-15.00: Parallel Panels 5
A: Dialogues with the Classics
Peter Faulkner (Exeter), Two Suicidal Philosophers in Victorian Poetry: Arnold’s Empedocles
and Tennyson’s Lucretius
Marylu Hill (Villanova), Socrates Gone Wilde: Socratic Reflections in the Wildean Mirror
Elizabeth Muller (University of Nantes), Yeats and the Pre-Socratic Philosophers
B: Dialogues with Idealism
Nathan Uglow (Leeds Trinity), Love Story: An Imperfect Account of a Victorian Concept
Sean McAlister (University of British Columbia), Poe's Interest/ Kant's Disinterest
Andrew Eastham (Independent Scholar), Bernard Bosanquet and the End of Hegelian
Aestheticism
15.00-15.30: Coffee/tea
15.30-17.00: Parallel Panels 6
A: The Quest for Truth
Jennifer Diann Jones (Independent Scholar), 'It is a Very Hard Thing to Say the Exact Truth': Feuerbach’s Influence on George Eliot's Concept of Realism
Kristen Renzi, (Indiana), Toward a Feminist Pragmatist Literary Analysis: The Uses of Pragmatism for Literary Studies
Frederik Van Dam (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven), Epistemology and Ethics in the Legal Novel: Anthony Trollope's Hermeneutics of Instinct
B: Friedrich Nietzsche
Thomas Greaves (UEA), Beyond Astonishment and Admiration: Nietzsche's Transformation of Wonder
Will Meakins (Essex) Carlyle and Nietzsche: Community and Scepticism
Nidesh Lawtoo (Lausanne) D. H. Lawrence and the Mimetic Dissolution of the Ego: From Nietzsche to Deleuze
17.00-17.30: Closing roundtable discussion
Any enquiries, please get in touch! k.hext@ex.ac.uk
Provisional Programme
Friday 10th September
11.00-12.30: Registration (Refreshments and a light lunch will be served)
12.30-12.45: Welcome
12.45-14.00: Keynote Speaker: Prof. Michael Wood (Princeton), Title TBC
Chair: Prof. Regenia Gagnier (Exeter)
14.00-14.30: Coffee/tea
14.30-16.00: Parallel Panels 1
A: Aesthetics
Thomas Karshan (Queen Mary, London), On Free Play in Literature and Aesthetics, 1850-1910
David Taylor (Roehampton), Art … A Priestly Function
Patricia Zakreski (Exeter), The Philosophy of Design and the Art of Fiction
B: Science
Andrew Mangham (Reading), Dickens, Medicine and the Philosophy of Science
Philipp Erchinger (Exeter), Knowing How to Guess: Darwin’s Hypotheses, Kepler’s Discoveries, and the Relationship between Science and Art
Louise Lee (King's College, London), 'A Mouth at the Top': Nonsense-world Physiognomy and the Respatialisation of the Face in Lewis Carroll and Charles Darwin
16.00-17.30: Parallel Panels 2
A: The Fin de Siècle
Regenia Gagnier (Exeter), Title TBC
Michael Bell (Warwick), Myth, Literature and Modernity: A Question of Priority
Sara Crangle (Sussex), Fin-de-Siècle Laughters
B: Form and Composition
Martin Simonson (University of the Basque Country), Henry David Thoreau and Edward Thomas: The Aesthetics of Walking
Demelza Hookway (Exeter), 'What John Stuart Mill Saw': Mona Caird’s Dialogue with Mill Cumhur Yılmaz Madran (Pamukkale University), Existentialism Displayed in Conrad’s Lord Jim
17.30-18.30: Wine Reception (kindly sponsored by Pirongs Educational Publishers)
19.30 onwards: Gala Dinner (Holland Hall, University of Exeter)
_________________________________________________________
Saturday 11th September
09.30-11.00: Parallel Panels 3
A: Poetry As Philosophy
Marion Thain (Birmingham), Phenomenology and Lyric Form
Karen Simecek (Warwick), The Experience of Poetry and its Role in Philosophical Inquiry
Nour Aweti (Leicester), The Poetical Philosophy of Constance Naden
Conor Carville (Reading) & Michael Halewood (Essex), Whitehead, Poetry and the Bifurcation of Nature
B: Philosophy through Fiction
David R. Sorensen (Saint Joseph's University), 'An Indefinable, Tentative Process': Carlyle, George Eliot, and the Redemption of Philosophy Through History and Fiction
Peter Rawlings (UWE), Henry James, What Maisie Knew, and Epistemology
Julian Wolfreys (Loughborough), Is There a Philosophy in This Text: Epistemological Countersignatures and Traces in Literature of the Nineteenth Century
11.00-12.30: Parallel Panels 4
A: Ralph Waldo Emerson and George Santayana
David M. Robinson (Oregon State), Emerson, Empiricism, and 'The Natural Method of Mental Philosophy'
David Greenham (UWE), Emerson Among The Philosophers
Ricardo Miguel-Alfonso (Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha), No More Barbaric Yawps: George Santayana and the Problem of Modern Poetry
B: Walter Pater: Rewriting Discourse and Identity
Kit Andrews (Western Oregon) The Essay as Philosophical-Literary Form: Pater’s Plato and Platonism
Adam Lee (Jesus College, Oxford) Platonism in Walter Pater’s The Renaissance
Sarah Townley (Nottingham). 'A Certain Kind of Temperament': Walter Pater and the Art of Individualism
12.30-13.30: Lunch
13.30-15.00: Parallel Panels 5
A: Dialogues with the Classics
Peter Faulkner (Exeter), Two Suicidal Philosophers in Victorian Poetry: Arnold’s Empedocles
and Tennyson’s Lucretius
Marylu Hill (Villanova), Socrates Gone Wilde: Socratic Reflections in the Wildean Mirror
Elizabeth Muller (University of Nantes), Yeats and the Pre-Socratic Philosophers
B: Dialogues with Idealism
Nathan Uglow (Leeds Trinity), Love Story: An Imperfect Account of a Victorian Concept
Sean McAlister (University of British Columbia), Poe's Interest/ Kant's Disinterest
Andrew Eastham (Independent Scholar), Bernard Bosanquet and the End of Hegelian
Aestheticism
15.00-15.30: Coffee/tea
15.30-17.00: Parallel Panels 6
A: The Quest for Truth
Jennifer Diann Jones (Independent Scholar), 'It is a Very Hard Thing to Say the Exact Truth': Feuerbach’s Influence on George Eliot's Concept of Realism
Kristen Renzi, (Indiana), Toward a Feminist Pragmatist Literary Analysis: The Uses of Pragmatism for Literary Studies
Frederik Van Dam (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven), Epistemology and Ethics in the Legal Novel: Anthony Trollope's Hermeneutics of Instinct
B: Friedrich Nietzsche
Thomas Greaves (UEA), Beyond Astonishment and Admiration: Nietzsche's Transformation of Wonder
Will Meakins (Essex) Carlyle and Nietzsche: Community and Scepticism
Nidesh Lawtoo (Lausanne) D. H. Lawrence and the Mimetic Dissolution of the Ego: From Nietzsche to Deleuze
17.00-17.30: Closing roundtable discussion
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