The Consortium invites scholars to join our topical working groups for challenging and collegial discussion of interesting publications in their fields and of each others’ works-in-progress.
Each group meets monthly. All interested scholars are welcome to participate via online video conferencing.
To join a working group, you must have an account on the Consortium website first.
Please set your timezone.
Book presentation of
“Beauty: the Body as Artefact. Historical Sources from Cicero to Goya”, ed. by Romana Sammern and Julia Saviello (Routledge 2026, OA, DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003464846) and
“Selling Pharmaka, buying health in ancient Greece and Rome: retail therapy”, ed. by Laurence Totelin (Routledge 2026)
Ian Stewart (EHESS), "There are no such things as Barbarous Languages: Humboldt, Du Ponceau, and the Languages of the World"
Abstract
Meeting Topic: We will discuss "Iridescence in Early Modern Natural History Drawings: Butterflies, Beetles, and some Birds" a work-in-progress by Giulia Simonini with initial comments and contextualization from Anne-Valérie Dulac.
Download the extended abstract and complete biographies.
Nuance provided by Nicole Liao, "Synthetic Color and Early Experiments in Biological Staining."
Jason Terry (Freie University Berlin) and Pamina Herrmann (Freie University Berlin): Sensing the Unknown: Worlds of Knowledge and Natural Histories in England and the English Empire (17th/18th Century)
At our inaugural meeting, Honghong Tinn will be presenting her recent book Island Tinkerers (MIT Press, 2025) with a focus on Chapter 10. It will be followed by a commentary from Chen-Pang Yeang, and then general discussion and Q&A.
Required reading: Chapter 10 and/or the introduction. Recommended reading: the entire book.
SUMMER FINDS!
Please join us as some of our fantastic OISH group-members share short presentations on their recent finds this Summer, including:
Introductory session:
a) Meet the conveners and the participants
b) Discuss the working group's orientation to the launch of a new journal, Psychedelic Cultures
c) Discuss plan for the year
Ali Glassie, Northeastern University, Syllabus Assessment Workshop: "Ocean Literacies"
In this session, we will read and discuss Andrew Williams's working paper, “The ILET Seminar of 1977 and the Entanglement of Academic and Political Networks in the Era of NWICO.“
Welcome Back and New Issue of HoPP* - Community Pharmacy Issue
Hosts/Speakers: Professors Kelly O'Donnell & Lucas Richert
In this meeting, the editors of HoPP will discuss Pharmacist-Historian Collaborations and reflect on the challenges and surprises of cross-disciplinary work.
Reviel Netz (Stanford University), discussing Archimedes' The Method
More details TBA
Speaker
Robert Wegner
Researcher, Casa de Oswaldo Cruz (COC/Fiocruz)
Professor, Graduate Program in History of Sciences and Health, Fiocruz
Presentation
Title and abstract will be announced soon.
About Robert
Robert Wegner holds a Ph.D. in Sociology and is a researcher at the Department of Research in History of Sciences and Health at Casa de Oswaldo Cruz (COC/Fiocruz), where he also teaches in the Graduate Program in History of Sciences and Health.
Richard Luke Fallon and Grace Exley, University of Cambridge
Introduction to Science Studies and the Long Eighteenth Century
This introductory session will set the foundation for the year to come. Participants will have the opportunity to meet new colleagues, learn about new research, and contribute ideas for meeting topics.
Agenda:
First meeting of the Engineering Book and Journal Club.
We'll discuss the book, Vleuten, Erik van der, Ruth Oldenziel, and Mila Davids. Engineering the Future, Understanding the Past: A Social History of Technology. Amsterdam University Press, 2018.
Opening ceremony: roundtable on DHST activities and its comissions.
In this session, representatives of different DHST Commissions will speak about the role and activities DHST is carrying out.
Fernando Amador II, "Street Showers: A Spatial & Environmental History of the American Fire Hydrant"
Geoff Belknap, National Museum of Scotland
ARCHIVING
In conversation wtih Laura Stark (Vanderbilt) and Adrianna Link (APS)
Seminar with Sean Coughlin (Prague) on "Alchemies of Scent: Five Years of Text, Experiment, Replication"
Kidder, James, and Daniel Bowen. A Representation of the Great Storm at Providence, Sept. 23rd 1815. Boston: Entered according to act of Congress, Oct. 8th, 1816: and published by D. Bowen and J. Kidder, Boston, 1816. 1-SIZE P11322.
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