Books from the Attic

I am reviewing my HOS books, looking for some survey and basic ones to help with my end of the year project (although I continue to bounce back and forth between historical video games and a Sci Rev website). I thought I would document by photo what I pulled down out of the attic. I put a tag with the publication date on the front.

Notice three things. 

1) I only pulled down things that were a survey across a time period. On that front, I'm also looking for VERY introductory HOS material, not an upper level, junior or senior level course.   An freshman level course can be made deeper and broader more easily, than an upper level course can be whittled down.

2) My last book was copyrighted in 1999. So I have QUITE a gap in new a current research. So the next couple of steps is going to be hunting around for more recently published HOS or HOT (History of Technology) survey textbooks (I'm pretty sure that Shapin has one--I'm going to go ahead and purchase that one). 

3) Also, I want to include some HOT, and my library certainly lacks that. So, I'll look for those too.

The smaller stack from the attic. This stack is missing Kuhn and Merchant, but that's because they live on the bookshelf in the living room, not in the attic.

 E.A. Burtt's The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Science, 1924 (I'm wondering what the copyright status on this one is? I think it was extended in 1932, putting it into that complicated category.)

 D.L. Hurd and J.J. Kipling, The Origins and Growth of Physical Science, Volume 1, 1958

David Knowles, The Evolution of Medieval Thought, 1962

Lynn White, Medieval Technology & Social Change, 1962

Thomas S. Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 1962 (A pivotal work that WILL be discussed, used, etc in a survey class.)

G.E.R. Lloyd, Ancient Culture and Society - Early Greek Science: Thales to Aristotle, 1970

Richard S. Westfall's The Construction of Modern Science: Mechanisms and Mechanics, 1971

Robert Mandrou's From Humanism to Science, 1480 - 1700, 1973

Carolyn Merchant's The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology, and the Scientific Revolution, 1980

Look at how special!!

Elizabeth L. Eisenstein's The Printing Revolution in Early Modern Europe, 1983

Londa Schiebinger's The Mind Has No Sex? Women in the Origins of Modern Science, 1989 

Margaret C. Jacob, The Cultural Meaning of the Scientific Revolution, 1988

David C. Lindberg's The Beginnings of Western Science, 1992 (This is the good survey text that I have. As part of this project, I may be rereading this for the final project, just to get a sense of layout. However, ending in 1450, I really need another supplemental text to finish the Sci Revolution and a lot of these bleed over into the Enlightenment.)

Steven Shapin, A Social History of Truth, 1994

Dorinda Outram, The Enlightenment, 1995

John Henry, The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science, 1997 (This is a quick little text that I will reread as well.)

H. Floris Cohen, The Scientific Revolution: A Historiographical Inquiry, 1994 (A history of the history written about the Scientific Rev, I figured just looking at the table of contents would be helpful, but I think I have those. I'm really looking for post 1990s.)

Edited by W. Clark, J. Golinski, and S. Schaffer, The Sciences in Enlightened Europe, 1999 (This includes so really good topical pieces on newer research.)

Why, hello there, stranger.

My name is Amanda, and I'll be you flight attendant for this wild ride. You might be asking yourself, "What is this blog?" or more importantly "Who blogs these days? Everyone is doing a podcast." You raise great questions.

As the name implies, I'm a crafty historian. *eyes roll* You might be wondering exactly what I mean by "crafty historian."  And this time I have a more comprehensive answer for you.  I am both crafty and also a (an--we can have this argument later) historian. And part of my mission as a historian is to make others think about the fact that history is crafted.

That's right. History is all made up. Before I get a variety of emails complaining about my lack of historical understanding, let me explain. For the most part, those of you that have dedicated your lives to history and that's what you are doing for a living completely understand this idea. It's not new.  Most of what I post on here will not be new. I'm talking to the rest of you. I haven't been a teacher for an exceptionally long time--three years at the elementary/middle school level and then a year and one half or so at the local community college. But it is certainly a REVOLUTIONARY idea when I say that EVERYTHING you read has a bias; it's been constructed; it is arguing something; it is CRAFTED. That's right, take it to a logical conclusion.  It's art!

Yeah, media is biased. But also yeah, your history textbook is biased.  And so is every political campaign, and conversation you have. "They" (the authors) are trying very hard, to present a coherent and cognizant message about what our life is today.  This is a little more nuanced, but even the "data" is biased. It's pretty easy to take what one is looking for in a scientific study and make it fit to your argument. What to do, what to do?

Well, and people LOVE to think that they are doing this, THINK FOR YOURSELF.  That's what I'm trying to do here. You might find contradictory views.  Things that are very fringe and weird. Articles that have nothing to do with history at all, and everything to do with teleportation. This is all part of my thinking process.

I'll certainly have articles on history. I listen to A LOT of podcast and hope to stream them here. Pictures, comics, and maps that I think are beautiful, telling, or shocking will be posted here.  This blog is a product of my classes at Northern Virginia Community College, but also of a new realization.  The internet is a vast place.  I want a place to go that has radical links to ideas that I'm interested in.  We need ways to break down and find information on the internet. So that's what I'm doing here.

I have a lot of things saved up for my readers.  I hope that I will be able to post every other day.  That is a lot of dedication.  But it's pretty rare, that I don't find something spectacular on the web every other day.

To my students: this is a great resource outside of the class material.

To my family and friends: this is a great way to know what I'm thinking about each week.

Please, listen or read what I've posted.  It may open up a whole other (semi-real internet/informational) world that you didn't realize existed.  AND then post your comments, I'll try to respond for a bit.  And look at other interesting things that you've posted there.

So ignore the knitting links if you want. Listen to the podcasts if you want. Look at the pictures if you want.

"History is a pack of lies we play on the dead." --Voltaire

Happy 2.22!

This is a place where I can share history and comedy podcasts, fun articles and pictures, books, music, and projects I'm working on. Be on the look out, nerds!