Repositioning Victorian sciences : shifting centres in nineteenth-century scientific thinking / edited by David Clifford ... [and others].

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Clifford, David.

Edward Potts Cheyney Memorial Fund.

Series:

Anthem nineteenth century studies

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Science--Great Britain--History--19th century.

Science.

Great Britain.

History.

Great Britain--Intellectual life--19th century.

Intellectual life.

Physical Description:

x, 254 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

London ; New York : Anthem Press, 2006.

Summary:

'Sciences' were named and formed with great speed in the nineteenth century. Yet what constitutes a 'true' science? The Victorian era facilitated the rise of practices such as phrenology and physiognomy, so-called sciences that lost their status and fell out of use rather swiftly. This collection of essays seeks to examine the marginalised sciences of the nineteenth century in an attempt to define the shifting centres of scientific thinking, specifically asking: how do some sciences emerge to occupy central ground and how do others become consigned to the margins? The essays in this collection explore the influence of nineteenth-century culture on the rise of these sciences, investigating the emergence of marginal sciences such as scriptural geology and spiritualism. Repositioning Victorian Sciences is a valuable addition to our understanding of nineteenth-century science in its original context, and will also be of great interest to those studying the era as a whole.

Contents:

1 Margins and Centres / Alex Warwick 1

Section I Shifted Centres

2 'Speakers Concerning the Earth': Ruskin's Geology After 1860 / Caroline Trowbridge 17

3 Swimming at the Edges of Scientific Respectability: Sea Serpents in the Victorian Era / Sherrie Lyons 31

4 'The Drugs, The Blister and the Lancet are all Laid Aside': Hydropathy and Medical Orthodoxy in Scotland, 1840-1900 / Alastair Durie 45

5 Anna Kingsford: Scientist and Sorceress / Alison Butler 59

6 A Science for One or a Science for All? Physiognomy, Self-Help, and the Practical Benefits of Science / Lucy Hartley 71

Section II Contested Knowledges

7 'Supposed Differences': Lydia Becker and Victorian Women's Participation in the BAAS / Susan David Bernstein 85

8 A Fair Trial for Spiritualism?: Fighting Dirty in the Pall Mall Gazette / Elisabeth Wadge 95

9 'This is Ours and For Us': The Mechanic's Magazine and Low Scientific Culture in Regency London / James Mussell 107

10 How did the Conservation of Energy Become 'The Highest Law in All Science'? / Ted Underwood 119

11 'Scriptural Geology', Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation and Contested Authority in Nineteenth-Century British Science / John M. Lynch 131

12 'This House is a Temple of Research': Country-House Centres for Late Victorian Science / Donald L. Opitz 143

Section III Entering The Modern

13 Fresnel's Particular Waves: Models of Light as Catalytic Modes of Worldmaking in Early Modern Times / Bernd Klahn 157

14 Re-imagining Heaven: Victorian Lunar Studies and the Anxiety of Loneliness / David Clifford 171

15 'You Should Get Your Head Examined': Freudian Psychoanalysis and the Limits of Nineteenth-Century Science / Peter Naccarato 183

16 Scholars, Scientists and Sexual Inverts: Authority and Sexology in Nineteenth-Century Britain / Heike Bauer 197

17 Unmasking Immorality: Popular Opposition to Laboratory Science in Late Victorian Britain / Martin Willis 207.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [219]-254).

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Edward Potts Cheyney Memorial Fund.

ISBN:

1843312123

OCLC:

66392858