Unearthed : science and environment across mineral frontiers / Patrick Anthony.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Anthony, Patrick (Historian of science), Author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Humboldt, Alexander von, 1769-1859.

Humboldt, Alexander von.

Environmental sciences--History--19th century.

Environmental sciences.

Earth sciences--History--19th century.

Earth sciences.

Mineral industries--19th century.

Mineral industries.

History, Modern--19th century.

History, Modern.

Imperialism and science.

Physical Description:

xiii, 320 pages, 12 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (some color), maps (some color) ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Chicago, IL ; London : The University of Chicago Press, 2026.

Summary:

"How nineteenth-century environmental sciences laid the groundwork for global mineral extraction. Unearthed depicts a pivotal moment during the nineteenth century: As European and settler schemes to govern ever larger territories intensified, the earth and atmospheric sciences were also becoming more global in scope, assembling models of the planet while making use of militarized or highly industrialized systems. These efforts were informed by the physique du monde, or global physics, of Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), a program of vast data collection that spanned four hemispheres that aimed to determine general, scientific laws about the planet and its environments. Using Humboldt's itineraries as a frame, Unearthed traces an information order that linked far-flung industrial sites and frontier stations, from Prussian provinces to the Spanish and Russian empires. Humboldt intersected with Saxon miners, Mexican cartographers, and Siberian surveyors, among other itinerant Germans who mobilized the labor and resources of widespread mining operations for international surveys of earth and air. Interweaving the histories of capital and climate, Patrick Anthony takes readers from mines to mountains to show how the sciences of Humboldt's circuits both measured and made modern natures. These sciences of the mineral frontier, he argues, ultimately laid the groundwork for carbon-intensive economics and a logic of unending extraction. Wide-ranging and ambitious, Unearthed will interest scholars working in the history of science, global history, and the environmental humanities"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction : underlands, empires, and atmospheres

Tableau makers and earth science on a Prussian frontier

Subterranean skies : physique du monde and its workers

Colonial Mexico and the Cordilleran survey sciences

The geo-atmospherics of empire : Siberia and the steppe

Berlin between empires : trafficking in the global

Conclusion : toward a history of extractive sciences.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780226847498

0226847497

9780226847511

0226847519

OCLC:

1531081927