Teaching Methods Using Collections and Their Ecologies
(more info soon)
Working Groups
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.
- Log in, or create an account
- Click on a group below
- Click on the "Request Membership" link
Upcoming Meetings
Please set your timezone.
Thursday, December 3, 2026, 2:00 - 3:30 pm EST
Maria Zarifi, "Epidemic Environments: Air, Uncertainty, and State Power on the Greek Island of Poros, 1837"
Friday, December 4, 2026, 11:00 am - 12:30 pm EST
Laura Lenzi, Japan After Dark (Cambridge 2026), chapters 1, 3. Skim intro if you can. See the book's TOC here: https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/japan-after-dark/3149361D47CB1F1D331909733A694D0E
Friday, December 4, 2026, 12:00 - 1:30 pm EST
Kyle Olson, Washington University in St. Louis
"Curriculum Design for Collections-Based Research Training"
Monday, December 7, 2026, 12:00 - 1:30 pm EST
TEACHING
In conversation with Fritz Davis (Purdue) and Stephen Weldon (Oklahoma).
Monday, December 7, 2026, 2:00 - 3:30 pm EST
Seminar with Dorit Brixius (Dresden University of Technology) on "Crafting Care: French Noblewomen, Cosmetics, Creativity and Knowledge Exchange in the Grand Siècle".
Tuesday, December 8, 2026, 11:00 am - 12:30 pm EST
John Henderson (Birkbeck, University of London) Patience, Dedication and Hard Work: Nurses and the Care of the Sick Poor in Early Modern Italian Hospitals
Wednesday, December 9, 2026, 9:30 - 11:00 am EST
Guest expert: Rocco Gaudenzi.
Reading: Modern Physics and Philosophy East and West: Nishida, Bohr, Yukawa
Wednesday, December 9, 2026, 12:00 - 1:30 pm EST
Meeting Topic: "Chemistry, Commerce and Cobalt Blue" Discussion of a work-in-progress
Author: Charlotte Abney Salomon
Commentator: Ernst Homburg, Professor Emeritus, Maastricht University.
Nuance: Lydia Pyne on ochres
Meeting Organizer: Sarah
Friday, December 11, 2026, 11:00 am - 12:30 pm EST
NEW BOOKS IN CONVERSATION
Lan Li (JHU) on Body Maps
and
Holly Fletcher (UCL) on Body Size in Early Modern Germany
Friday, December 11, 2026, 12:30 - 2:00 pm EST
Cecilia Slane (University of Oklahoma), “Fertilizer and Fuel: Scientific Explorations of Peat in the 19thCentury United States”
Tuesday, December 15, 2026, 10:00 - 11:30 am EST
NOTE SPECIAL DATE
Topic: History of Astronomy and Exobiology as a guide for understanding scientific discovery (and disappointments)
Tuesday, December 15, 2026, 2:00 - 3:30 pm EST
Morgan Hardy, University of Tennessee, paper title TBA
Wednesday, December 16, 2026, 12:00 - 1:30 pm EST
Speaker: Dr. Maeleigh Tidd, University of Miami
Title & Description: TBA
Thursday, December 17, 2026, 2:00 - 3:30 pm EST
E. A. Hunter (University of Chicago), TBA.
Monday, January 4, 2027, 12:00 - 1:30 pm EST
INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVES ON ACADEMIC FREEDOM
TBA
Tuesday, January 5, 2027, 8:00 - 9:30 am EST
Sathyaraj Venkatesan, "Unequal Burdens: COVID-19, BIPOC Communities, and Graphic Medical Narratives."
Wednesday, January 6, 2027, 10:30 am - 12:00 pm EST
Tanya Bakhmetyeva, University of Rochester
"In the name of Stalin: Soviet Scientific Alpinism and the Making of Scientific Authority in the Pamirs, 1928–1934"
Thursday, January 7, 2027, 2:00 - 3:30 pm EST
Peter Soppelsa, "Where, When, and Why did Rat Proofing Emerge?"
Friday, January 8, 2027, 12:30 - 2:00 pm EST
Martin Boden (Université de Liège ULiège- École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS): "Timber exploitation in the territories of present-day Belgium at the start of the Industrial Revolution, between 1750 and 1860"
Image
A nomenclature of colors for naturalists, : and compendium of useful knowledge for ornithologists. Robert Ridgway, curator, Department of Birds, United States National Museum.