PG and ECR Workshop - Creative Cities: Knowledge of Nature and Networks of Science

Thursday 26 June 2025, 09:00-17:30
Radcliffe Humanities Building, Woodstock Road, Oxford
visitors from charles university at oxford history of science museum

Visitors from Charles University, Prague, at Oxford’s History of Science Museum 2019

oxford students visiting pragues klementinum library hall

Oxford students visiting Prague’s Klementinum Library Hall 2023

 

Programme

26 June – Seminar Room, Radcliffe Humanities Building, Woodstock Road, Oxford

09:00–09:30 Arrival and Welcome (Erica Charters) 

09:30–11:00 Session 1: Health, State and Empire (Chair: Erica Charters)

Against Exclusivism: The Rats of William C. Hossack 1898–1913, Utsa Bose (Oxford)

The Birth of “State Medicine” in the Habsburg Monarchy from the Late 18th to the Early 19th Century, Tereza Liepoldová (Charles)

Eradicating Yaws: Intra- and Inter-Imperial Networks of Knowing, Philippa Monk (Oxford)

11:00–11:30 Break (Coffee/Tea)                                                                                                  

11:30–13:00 Session 2: Transit, Transmission, Translation (Chair: Alex Aylward)       

Abel-Victor Brandin (1778–1850): French Military Doctor and Medical Entrepreneur in Latin America during the Age of Revolutions, Benjamin Rymer (Oxford)

Aristotle, De Animalibus and the Bohemian Lands: A Case Study on the Transmission of Zoological Knowledge, Zuzana Vařáková (Charles)

"Is there not somebody who knows somebody who knows something of Japanese?": Networking Child Study across National and Linguistic Boundaries c. 1894–1907, Julia Gustavsson (Oxford)

13:00–14:00 Lunch                                                                                                                     

14:00–15:30 Session 3: Natures (Chair: Madeline White)

Tracing the Stereotypes: The Shifting Image of Lamarckian Natural Philosophy, Jana Švorcová (Charles)

Wind, Power, and Dragons: Renewable Energy and the Reconstruction of the Coast in the Faroe Islands, Róisín Kennelly (Oxford)

"Metaempirical" and "φύσις-like": the Naturphilosophie Position of Count Buquoy (1781–1851), Lenka Ovčáčková (Charles)

15:30–15:45 Break (Coffee/Tea)                                                                                                  

15:45–17:15 Session 4: Natural Philosophies (Chair: Rob Iliffe)

Mirror, Model, Muse: Identity and Influence in the Institutional Correspondence of the Oxford, Dublin, and Royal Societies, Constance Hardesty (Oxford)

Discovering Newton: Iohannes Tessanek and Higher Mathematics in 18th Century Prague, Babeta Jurámiková (Charles)

Vojtěch Hladký (Charles) introduces his new book, On the Gods and the World: Orpheus and the Presocratics in the Derveni Papyrus (OUP, 2024)                     

17:15–17:30 Closing Remarks (Jacques Joseph, Alex Aylward)                                                      

Call for Papers

Dates: 26 June 2025
Location(s): Radcliffe Humanities Building
Submission deadline: Tuesday 3 June

Oxford and Prague have played central roles in developing innovative pedagogical systems in astronomy, biology, chemistry, medicine, and physics. Indeed, they have been heavily involved in fostering international networks of scientific and medical knowledge since the medieval period.  This workshop will focus on topics in the history of science, medicine, technology, and the environment, and the role of translations, networks, and place in shaping histories and practices of the knowledge of the natural world.  It will showcase work-in-progress from postgraduate students and early career researchers at the University of Oxford and Charles University (Prague), as part of the Fell-funded TORCH International Partnership: Creative Cities.

The Oxford Centre for the History of Science, Medicine, and Technology will host postgraduate students and researchers from Charles University on 26-27 June 2025.  In turn, in 2026 Charles University will host postgraduate students and researchers from the University of Oxford.  Presenters at OCHSMT’s June 2026 workshop will therefore have the opportunity to visit Prague in 2026, including visits to their key historic sites of scientific and medical research and discussions on international networks of knowledge. 

We invite postgraduate students and early career researchers at the University of Oxford to submit a short abstract (max. 250 words) and details of their Oxford University status to hsmt@history.ox.ac.uk by 3 June 2025.  We encourage research that focuses on the history and practice of knowledge of the natural world, and attention to how scientific and medical knowledge has been shaped by particular geographic contexts and international networks, whether in the past or the present. 

You can read more on this international collaboration here.