Denis J. B. Shaw. Reconnoitring Russia: Mapping, Exploring and Describing Early Modern Russia, 1613–1825.

Denis J. B. Shaw. Reconnoitring Russia: Mapping, Exploring and Describing Early Modern Russia, 1613–1825. London: UCL Press, 2024. ISBN: 9781800085923

open access: https://uclpress.co.uk/book/reconnoitring-russia/

Like many European countries during the Great Age of Discovery and Exploration, Russia embarked on policies of state building, exploration and imperial expansion. At the beginning of the fourteenth century, the territory under Moscow’s control was about twenty thousand square kilometres. By 1800 Russia’s empire had expanded to some eighteen million square kilometres. Russia had thus become one of the world’s greatest empires.

By focusing on such geographical practices as exploring, observing, describing, mapping and similar activities, Reconnoitring Russia seeks to explain how Russia’s rulers and its educated public came to know and understand the territory of their expanding state and empire, especially as a result of the modernizing policies of such sovereigns as Peter the Great and Catherine the Great. It places the Russian experience into a comparative context, showing how that experience compares with those of other European countries over the same period. The book adopts a broad chronological framework, exploring the age between 1613 when the Romanov dynasty assumed power and 1825, the conclusion of Alexander I’s reign, or what is often termed the end of the ‘long eighteenth century’.

Praise for Reconnoitring Russia

Reconnoitring Russia is an original contribution to two fields of scholarship: history of geography as a science and practices of exploration, and the history of the Russian Empire. The author was one of the most devoted historians of the geography of Russia and this is the first comprehensive analysis of the development of geographical knowledge in the period under study to be published either in English or in Russian.’

Julia Lajus, Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in Social Sciences and Humanities (NIAS) in Amsterdam

Ere Nokkala, Jonas Gerlings (eds.) The Process of Enlightenment

 Ere Nokkala, Jonas Gerlings (eds.) The Process of Enlightenment. Essays by and inspired by Hans Erich Bödeker. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press 2024. ISBN: 9781802071863

The historiographical concept “Enlightenment” has for a long time wavered between the idea of a single unified Enlightenment and the notion of multiple competing enlightenments. This volume revisits this seeming contradiction by asserting that the Enlightenment should be understood as a shared process of communication, seeking ways to accommodate and mediate rival ideologies and orient enlightenment projects towards the betterment of humankind.

Taking the work of the eminent Enlightenment scholar Hans Erich Bödeker as their point of departure, the different chapters seek to explore this perspective through specific case studies of political communication. Readers are offered a selection of Bödeker’s texts never previously translated into English, along with a series of contributions from his former colleagues, students, and collaborators. In doing so the book displays the broad scope of Bödeker’s own work, as well as the multiplicity of themes captured within the framework of the Enlightenment. Genres, modes, and strategies of communication are contrasted with the institutions and cultural practices underpinning them.

In exploring the depth and scope of Bödeker’s work, the volume pays tribute to a German tradition rooted in historical semantics, while at the same time querying its present state and its future.

So glad to have participated in this project and excited to have my copy of our new book in hand! JONAS GERLINGS and ERE NOKKALA, Introduction: Enlightenment as process

ANTHONY J. LA VOPA, Aufklärung reconceived: the contribution of Hans Erich Bödeker

I. Enlightenment as a process of communication

HANS ERICH BÖDEKER, Enlightenment as a process of communication

AVI LIFSCHITZ, Pitfalls of a communication process: the illicit publication of Frederick II’s writings

JONAS GERLINGS, Critique as a process of Enlightenment: Kant’s philosophising as communication

LÁSZLÓ KONTLER, Entretiens with Fontenelle, 1688-1803: translating politeness into science

THOMAS KAUFMANN, The early-eighteenth-century image of Luther and the Reformation

PATRICE VEIT, The concert as cultural practice

ANNE SAADA, Göttingen before Göttingen: the negotiation of the imperial university privilege

II. Enlightenment as a process of politicisation

HANS ERICH BÖDEKER, Reinhart Koselleck’s Enlightenment

HELGE JORDHEIM, Communication, politicisation, Enlightenment: Vertrag on the move

MARTIN GIERL, Monks, Jews, polemics, Enlightenment

ADRIANA LUNA-FABRITIUS, Visions of sociability in early modern Neapolitan political thought

ERE NOKKALA, The politicisation of the Enlightenment in Sweden: political culture, publicity and freedom of the press

HAGEN SCHULZ-FORBERG, The inequalities of progress: Jean-Baptiste Say’s theory of capitalism and the entrepreneur

HANS ERICH BÖDEKER, Enlightenment and modernity: an essay

Leszek Zasztowt: Under a Double Headed Eagle: Józef Mianowski. Biography of a Conservative.

Leszek Zasztowt: Under a Double Headed Eagle: Józef Mianowski. Biography of a Conservative. Amsterdam: Brill 2024. ISBN: 978-3-506-79472-7

What was life like in the territories annexed by Russia in the 19th century? What were the views and attitudes of the Poles living in lands belonging to the Russian Empire? How did people arrange their lives when they did not take up revolutionary action and foreswore an open struggle with the Tsarist regime? Could one be a Polish patriot without fighting gun in hand for independence? The Russians believed that Poles were genetically preordained to be anti-Russian. Even in the west of Europe this charge of morbid Russophobia was taken to be the rule. It seems that this was one of the greatest falsehoods that Russian imperial propaganda managed to implement in the West. Leszek Zasztowt unfolds in this fascinating biography a much more complex reality through the life story of the medical scientist, academic and political activist Józef Mianowski (1804–1879), a man who served Russia and loved Poland.

cfa: (Re)Gendering Science: Policies, Practices and Discourses in Socialist Context and Beyond

 ❗️❗️❗️Open call for papers: 

📌History of Communism in Europe no. 16/2025

(Re)Gendering Science: Policies, Practices and Discourses in Socialist Context and Beyond

✒️Coordinators: dr. Irina Nastasa-Matei & dr. Luciana Jinga 

This call for papers invites contributors for a special issue of the scientific journal History of Communism in Europe, focusing on the relationship between women and science in socialist contexts. We aim to explore how women engaged with science both within national contexts (in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, or the Global South), and in transnational contexts (whether within the framework of socialist movements and organizations or through academic networks and scientific collaborations that included women from socialist countries and/or took place in these regions).

Image: Raluca Ripan and her students

Photo credits: Dolgozó nő [The Working Woman], 1960

URL: https://www.iiccmer.ro/publicatii/2024/open-call-for-papers-history-of-communism-in-europe-no-16-2025/

hybrid lecture: Anna Sokolova: Wild Crop Socialism: Consumer Cooperation, Food Security, and Transnational Networks in Cold War Soviet Union

Wild Crop Socialism: Consumer Cooperation, Food Security, and Transnational Networks in Cold War Soviet Union

Anna Sokolova,

University of Ostrava

November 6th, 2024. Wednesday, 15.00-16.30

Room XH114 (Refresh Social Lab), Building XH - Havlíčkovo nábřeží 3120, FA UO. for online access contact https://ff.osu.cz/chsd/viktor-pal/93696/.

The Soviet Union was known for its large-scale resource extraction, particularly timber and hydrocarbons. These industries supported new technologies, infrastructures, and workforce flows. However, small-scale resource extraction, initiated by the Soviet state through the Consumer Cooperation Union (Tsentrosoyz), impacted natural environments and society differently. This system involved numerous pickers gathering and trading wild crops for cash and imported industrial goods. This system created a network of individual economic agents operating within each region and established links with trading counterparts worldwide. This talk, I will explore how this wild crop economy captured the complex social and economic processes of the late Soviet Union and how this knowledge can help us understand the different paths taken by the former Soviet republics as independent states in the post-Soviet transition.

Anna Sokolova a social and environmental historian of Soviet and post-Soviet Russia. She received her PhD from the University of Zürich. Anna is currently a senior researcher at the University of Ostrava.

Organized by the Department of History, Centre for Economic and Social History. Hosted by the Centre for the Philosophy of Historiography.

CFP: Large Language Models for the History, Philosophy, and Sociology of Science - Berlin 04/2025

 CFP: Large Language Models for the History, Philosophy, and Sociology of Science - Berlin 04/2025

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We invite contributions to our workshop on using large language models (LLMs) in the history, philosophy, and sociology of science (HPSS). The workshop will focus on exploring use cases and proposals for how, and to what extent, LLMs might help overcome long-standing challenges in studies of how science works. The event will take place from April 2–4, 2025, at Technische Universität Berlin, Germany. Attendance (online and on site) will be free and open to the public but registration will be required. To contribute a talk, please submit abstracts of 300–600 words by December 31, 2024, to arno.simons@tu-berlin.de.

Large Language Models for the History, Philosophy, and Sociology of Science

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Gerd Graßhoff (HU Berlin), Arno Simons (TU Berlin), Adrian Wüthrich (TU Berlin), and Michael Zichert (TU Berlin), 10629 Berlin (Deutschland)

02.04.2025 - 04.04.2025

Bewerbungsschluss: 31.12.2024

Workshop topics

Computational approaches to the history of science are in the process of establishing themselves among the standard repertoire of tools in the field and we have seen remarkable successes in their application already. Subfields of sociology of science have focused, since long, on quantitative methods such as bibliometrics and scientometrics. More recently, philosophy of science has experienced a shift towards allowing more empirical approaches including large-scale algorithmic analyses of scientific or methodological concepts. Computational tools can not only help reduce the workload in traditional research in these fields but, more importantly, also open up new avenues which to explore would otherwise be hopeless.

Analyses of co-occurrences and word frequencies as well as more advanced techniques such as topic modeling have helped go beyond identifying only structural features of scientific activities and began scratching the surface of semantics. However, a deeper understanding of scientific concepts, the structure of scientific arguments, and the process of knowledge transformation and spread have remained formidable challenges for computational approaches in the mentioned fields.

With the advent of LLMs this might change now. Natural language processing and machine learning have made a spectacular leap forward in their attempt to capture and analyze meaning and grammatical structures of texts. This promises that LLMs can help HPSS researchers meet the aforementioned challenges. However—besides general issues such as opacity, bias and interpretability—the use of LLMs for HPSS is likely to face unique obstacles arising from the specialized nature of scientific language as well as the specific perspectives and objectives of HPSS. It will be the main goal of this workshop to see how, given these obstacles, the most recent advances in LLM development can help overcome long-standing challenges in HPSS.

Accordingly, the workshop will address two key themes, with the goal of synthesizing them over the course of the event. On one hand, contributions should articulate the specific needs and desiderata of HPSS researchers—what they hope LLMs can achieve for their work. On the other hand, the current state of LLM development should be critically examined to determine to what extent these research goals are becoming attainable. Ideally, contributions will address both these objectives, though submissions focused on only one of them are also welcome.

We particularly encourage contributions that focus on:

- Use cases that demonstrate how LLMs can help resolve current issues in HPSS

- Examples of how LLMs allow researchers to ask and answer new types of questions in HPSS

- How new types of sources and data, made analyzable through LLMs, contribute to novel insights in HPSS research

We look for contributions that help resolve questions like these:

- How can LLMs help gain new perspectives on long-standing problems in HPSS such as determining the relevant contexts of knowledge claims, the dynamics of scientific controversies, problems of incommensurability, and generalizability of case studies?

- How can LLMs handle the specialized language of scientific texts, including technical jargon, citations, and mathematical formulas?

- How can LLMs bridge the gap between qualitative and computational methods and help overcome their limitations?

- How can LLMs be integrated into existing theoretical and methodological frameworks in HPSS, or how should these frameworks evolve to accommodate LLM-based analysis?

- How can we evaluate the validity of results generated by LLMs, given their opacity?

- How can LLMs account for the temporal development of scientific language and knowledge over time?

Format and practical information

The workshop will take place from April 2-4, 2025 at Technische Universität Berlin. The program will consist of an invited keynote and contributed short talks (15+10 min) as well as additional sessions for discussions. Attendance (online and on site) will be free and open to the public but registration will be required. Information on this will follow closer to the date.

To contribute a talk, please send an abstract of your planned contribution of 300-600 words by e-mail to arno.simons@tu-berlin.de by December 31, 2024. We encourage every contributor to present on site and to participate in the whole workshop program. In exceptional cases, we will offer the possibility to present remotely.

Participation of underrepresented groups is particularly welcome, and we may be able to offer financial support to cover travel costs for contributing authors in exceptional cases. Please indicate in your submission if you would like to apply for financial support.

We plan to publish the slides, videos, and abstracts on a suitable platform. We also plan to write a report on the workshop and on the perspectives resulting from it.

https://www.tu.berlin/hps-mod-sci/workshop-llms-for-hpss

Marek Kunicki-Goldfinger: Towarzystwo Kursów Naukowych 1978-1980 [Society for Academic Courses 1978-1980]. Kraków : Księgarnia Akademicka, 2024

 Marek Kunicki-Goldfinger: Towarzystwo Kursów Naukowych 1978-1980 [Society for Academic Courses 1978-1980]. Kraków : Księgarnia Akademicka, 2024. ISBN: 9788383680330

Electronic version: https://books.akademicka.pl/publishing/catalog/book/682

[Polski poniżej]

Keywords: 

Society for Academic Courses 1978-1980, university, freedom of science, freedom of education, social resistance, intellectuals in the People’s Republic of Poland, communist repression in the People’s Republic of Poland 

Synopsis

SOCIETY FOR ACADEMIC COURSES 1978-1980

This book is divided into two main parts: the first, presented by the publisher as an original monograph, and the second, a collection of documents. The book explores the foundation, operation, and history of a state-independent institution established in communist Poland in January 1978 to defend fundamental human rights, including freedom of conscience, thought, expression, science, and education. This institution was named the Towarzystwo Kursów Naukowych [Society for Academic Courses], referencing the tradition of a similar organisation that existed in partitioned Poland when, during a brief period of liberalisation following the 1905 Revolution, the Russian authorities allowed such an institution to operate legally in the so-called Kingdom of Poland.

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Książka Marka Kunickiego-Goldfingera dotyczy działania niezależnego od władzy komunistycznej

stowarzyszenia, Towarzystwa Kursów Naukowych (TKN), w okresie od stycznia 1978 roku. Jego powstanie poprzedzone było inicjatywą młodzieży akademickiej i przede wszystkim grupy naukowców, którzy zorganizowali od jesieni 1977 r. regularne, niezależne od władzy wykłady (tzw. Uniwersytet Latający) przede wszystkim z najnowszej historii i literatury. Do podjęcia takich działań zmuszały ich komunistyczne władze PRL, które ograniczały i cenzurowały szczególnie te obszary nauki i kultury.

Publikacja składa się z dwóch części. W pierwszej przedstawiono genezę, znaczenie, powstanie i opis funkcjonowania niezależnych wykładów organizowanych przez Towarzystwo Kursów Naukowych w Warszawie, Krakowie, Wrocławiu i innych ośrodkach akademickich. Następnie pokazano reakcję na te wykłady (pozytywną – Kościoła i negatywną – władz politycznych i Służby Bezpieczeństwa). Opisano działania mające na celu rozbijanie wykładów, które zakończyły się użyciem siły fizycznej przez zorganizowane przez władzę bojówki. W rezultacie TKN musiał zawiesić otwarte wykłady przeprowadzane w prywatnych mieszkaniach i zaczął je organizować w kościołach albo w postaci zamkniętych zajęć seminaryjnych. Rozbudowano też wówczas podziemną działalność wydawniczą, udostępniając publicznie wyniki badań niezależnych naukowców, nie tylko z historii i literatury, ale też z ekonomii, pedagogiki i filozofii politycznej. Zbudowano też system stypendialny wspierający młodych naukowców niemogących prowadzić badań w ramach oficjalnych studiów. Uzyskano bardzo szerokie poparcie, również finansowe, od polskiej emigracji (szczególnie J. Giedroycia i Radia Wolna Europa), a także wsparcie od środowisk naukowych, intelektualnych i nauczycielskich z Zachodu (szczególnie z USA, Wielkiej Brytanii i Francji). Rozpoczęto też współpracę ze środowiskiem nauczycielskim, czego efektem był Latający Ogólniak przygotowujący młodych ludzi do studiów, a także szeroko kolportowany List do nauczycieli. Wiele pracy ideowej włożono w przywrócenie etosu niezależnej inteligencji, odpowiedzialnej za społeczeństwo, a także w odbudowę tradycji polskiej refleksji politycznej i światopoglądowej. W drugiej części książki TKN pokazano w świetle dokumentów, wybranych, ułożonych i opracowanych przez Marka Kunickiego-Goldfingera.

Miklos Müller oral history and István Deák interview accessioned a the Rockefeller Archives Center

 Miklos Müller oral history and István Deák interview accessioned a the Rockefeller Archives Center

This message is to announce the accession of the Miklos Müller oral history, along with an accompanying interview with István Deák, to the Rockefeller Archives Center (Accession #s 2024:077 and 2024:078). Müller and Deák were both members of the “Hungarian Roundtable” that met for decades, and the interviews will be of interest to historians of science, Hungary, World War II, the Cold War, the Hungarian diaspora in New York City, and post-Cold War studies.

Contact Information

William deJong-Lambert

william.dejong-lambert(at)bcc.cuny.ed

Agnodike Travel Research Fellowships

 Agnodike Travel Research Fellowships

Commission on Women and Gender in History of Science, Technology, and Medicine

Division of History of Science and Technology, International Union of History and Philosophy of Science and Technology

2024–2025 Competition: Applications Due 5 November 2024

The Commission on Women and Gender Studies in History of Science, Technology and Medicine offers biannually a research travel fellowship of up to 1000€ to scholars who are either in their final stages of their doctoral research or in the early stages of their post-doctoral research but still within five years of receiving the PhD.

The Agnodike, named after the first female physician and midwife in ancient Greece (4th c. BCE), is intended exclusively for transportation and accommodation expenses incurred by early career scholars who are conducting research in archives anywhere in the world. To be eligible, applicants must be in the early stages of their careers—within 5 years of receiving their PhDs. Eligibility is independent of gender, nationality, ethnicity or the location of the applicant’s academic institution or site of research. The Agnodike is offered globally but only on topics concerning women and gender studies in history of science, technology and medicine.

The Commission requires an application in English, preferably one PDF file that consists of a cover letter, a research proposal (1500 words or less), CV, a detailed budget of anticipated travel-related expenses (transportation, lodging, etc.), list of other funding sources (pending or received)*, and two letters of recommendation, one being from the PhD advisor. (*Note:  Only expenses not covered by other funding sources are eligible for reimbursement under this grant.) The research proposal should specify a work plan for the research during the fellowship period and the required travel. The awardee of the research grant will receive an invitation to present her/his work in the closest forthcoming symposium organized by the Commission. All applications must be submitted no later than 5 November 2024. The selection committee’s review will take into consideration the proposal’s quality, clarity, specificity, and alignment with the Commission’s focus on women and gender studies. Awards will be extended for use between late Autumn 2024 through Summer 2025. Submit applications to the attention of Dr. Isabelle Lémonon, Treasurer: ilemonon@gmail.com.

The Commission on Women and Gender Studies in History of Science, Technology and Medicine was founded in 1981 by the General Assembly of the International Union of the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology (IUHPST). The Commission promotes communication among scholars working on women’s history and gender studies in the history of science, technology and medicine and fosters research in these areas. The Commission sponsors symposia at the quadrennial International Congresses of the IUHPST’s Division of History of Science and Technology (DHST) and, in between the Congresses, further conferences on women and gender studies in history of science, technology, and medicine. For more information please visit our website https://agnodike.org/, request to be added to our electronic mailing list (send an email to nuritki@openu.ac.il), or “like” our Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/cowogs.

URL: https://agnodike.org/scholar-resources/agnodike-travel-research-fellowship/

Warsaw Spatial Humanities seminar

  Dear Colleagues!

We are happy to invite you to the Warsaw Spatial Humanities seminar. It will be our 9th #WarSHum already! This time our speaker is going to be Professor Maciej Gorny from the Institute of History, Polish Academy of Sciences. The title of the lecture is:

"Geopolitical thinking starts from cradle: Erwin Hanslik's life and work (1880-1940)".

Attached poster will give you more details about the presentation. Please, register here (https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScHJ1gPRRlDwzVK_jMGMaYfK1QLMy5MPxU1a9JqNJ61zMqXxQ/viewform) to join us on the 29th of October, 2024. We start the seminar at 12:00 CET (11:00 London time).

Best regards

Francis, Tomasz, and Wieslawa [Warsaw Spatial Humanities]

Warsaw Spatial Humanities seminar

 Dear Colleagues!

We are happy to invite you to the Warsaw Spatial Humanities seminar. It will be our 9th #WarSHum already! This time our speaker is going to be Professor Maciej Gorny from the Institute of History, Polish Academy of Sciences. The title of the lecture is:

"Geopolitical thinking starts from cradle: Erwin Hanslik's life and work (1880-1940)".

Attached poster will give you more details about the presentation. Please, register here (https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScHJ1gPRRlDwzVK_jMGMaYfK1QLMy5MPxU1a9JqNJ61zMqXxQ/viewform) to join us on the 29th of October, 2024. We start the seminar at 12:00 CET (11:00 London time).

Best regards

Francis, Tomasz, and Wieslawa [Warsaw Spatial Humanities]

hybrid event: Bálint Varga (Universität Graz). Longing for the White Man’s Burden: Images of Civilization, Race, and the Colonial World Order in East-Central Europe, 1878–1939.´ Monday, October 21, 15:00 CET // 9 am EST

 hybrid event: Bálint Varga (Universität Graz). Longing for the White Man’s Burden: Images of Civilization, Race, and the Colonial World Order in East-Central Europe, 1878–1939. Monday, October 21, 15:00 CET // 9 am EST. Zoom & Masaryk Institute and Archives of the Czech Academy of Sciences

In 1886, the Bohemian medical doctor and traveler Emil Holub tried to Europeanize female fashion in Pandamatenga, a trading station near the Zambezi River, by distributing European-tailored skirts to local women. Holub’s attempt was deeply rooted in the conviction of the superiority of European-Christian-White lifestyle and norms. The feeling of being superior to people stuck at an earlier stage of development came along with a sense of duty to lead the backward toward progress. This sense of duty – the White Man’s Burden, as British poet Rudyard Kipling powerfully put it in his famous, homonymous poem – was widespread among colonizer societies, especially in the 19th century.

This talk will argue that the discourse of the White Man’s Burden can also be found in a Habsburg and post-Habsburg setting, indeed, among Czech, Hungarian, and Polish actors traditionally less associated with global interests. The talk will identify three different geographical areas where these actors imagined carrying the White Man’s Burden: in the Habsburg-ruled Bosnia; in Southeast Europe and the Ottoman Empire among the (imagined) Slavic and Turkic kin peoples; and in South America via settler-colonists. A fourth special group that thematized the White Man’s Burden consisted of missionaries who worked mostly in Africa and Asia. The talk will argue that this discourse was fragmented and often served as a narrative tool to argue for belonging to an imagined and idealized Europe.

Details and zoom link: https://www.mua.cas.cz/cs/udalost/longing-for-the-white-man-s-burden-images-of-civilization-race-and-the-colonial-world-order-in-east-central-europe-1878-1939

Image: Czech physician and explorer Emil Holub.

Call for Papers Central European History Convention, July 17th—19th 2025, University of Vienna

Call for Papers Central European History Convention, July 17th—19th 2025, University of Vienna / in person (not hybrid)

Further information: https://tinyurl.com/cehc-cfp

Deadline for proposals: January 31st 2025

Notification: February 24th 2025

Lin Lewis, Nana Osei-Opare (eds.): Socialism, Internationalism, and Development in the Third World: Envisioning Modernity in the Era of Decolonization

Su Lin Lewis, Nana Osei-Opare (eds.): Socialism, Internationalism, and Development in the Third World: Envisioning Modernity in the Era of Decolonization. London: Bloomsbury 2024. ISBN 9781350413436. open access

Description

In the wake of colonial and racial exploitation, political leaders, technocrats, activists, and workers across the Third World turned to socialism to offer a new vision of post-colonial development. Against a backdrop of decolonization, white supremacy, and the Cold War, they fostered anti-colonial solidarity and created cooperative frameworks for self-reliance.

In following these actors, the contributions to this volume show that “development” was not merely exported from North to South: people across the Global South collaborated with each other while engaging with a diversity of socialist ideas, from European Fabianism and Marxism to tailored African, Asian, and Latin American models. They led debates on race and inequality from the 1920s and 1930s and spearheaded local, regional, and internationalist efforts to re-envision modernity by the 1950s and 1960s.

By examining the limitations and legacies of socialist development initiatives in and across the Third World, Socialism, Internationalism, and Development in the Third World offers new perspectives on the intertwined histories of socialism, development, and international cooperation, with lessons for both past and present.

The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by UKRI and Rice University, USA. URL: https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/monograph?docid=b-9781350420175

Table of Contents

Introduction: Development Dreams from the Socialist South, Su Lin Lewis (Bristol University, UK) and Nana Osei-Opare (Rice University, USA).

1. Development and Difference: Alternative Genealogies of Uneven Development, 1920–1940, Kelvin Ng (Yale University, USA)

2. Debating Race and Revolutionary Socialism from the Latin American South, Jo Crow (University of Bristol, UK)

3. Pan-Africa, African Socialism, and the 'Federal Moment' of Decolonization, Marc Matera (University of California Santa Cruz,, USA)

4. Socialism, Internationalism, and Regime Survival: The Guomindang, China, and Taiwan in the 1940s and 1950s, Tehyun Ma (University of Sheffield, UK)

5. Three Logics of Indian Socialism: Historicizing Development under Capital, Matthew Shutzer (Duke University, USA)

6. Socialism and the Question of Third World Development in the Ideas of the Indonesian Socialist Party (PSI), Pradipto Niwandhono (Universitas Airlangga, Indonesia)

7. Cuban Internationalismo, Berthold Unfried and Claudia Martinez (both University of Vienna, Austria)

8. Politics of Development at Afro-Asian Women's Conferences, Su Lin Lewis (University of Bristol, UK) and Wildan Sena Utama (University of Gadjah Madah, Indonesia)

9. Ahmad Ali Kohzad's visit to China 1958: A Critical Reading, William Figueroa (University of Groningen, the Netherlands)

10. Forging the Vanguard of Developmental Socialism: Nationalization, Respectability and Ideological Struggles at Kivukoni College, Tanzania, Eric Burton (University of Innsbruck, Austria)

11. Fish, Discontent, and Socialist Modernities and Dreams in Kwame Nkrumah's Ghana, Nana Osei-Opare (Rice University, USA)

12, Indians as Experts on Democracy and Development: South-South Cooperation in the Nehru Years, Taylor Sherman (University of New South Wales, Australia)

13. Confronting Capitalism in Twentieth-Century Latin America, Kevin Young (University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA)

Afterword: Rethinking Socialist Developmentalisms in the “Third World”, David C. Engerman (Yale University, USA)

Oleksandr Avramchuk: Budując Republikę Ducha. Historia Programu Fulbrighta w Polsce w latach 1945–2020 [Building a Republic of the Spirit. A history of the Fulbright Program in Poland from 1945 to 2020].

Oleksandr Avramchuk: Budując Republikę Ducha. Historia Programu Fulbrighta w Polsce w latach 1945–2020 [Building a Republic of the Spirit. A history of the Fulbright Program in Poland from 1945 to 2020]. Warszawa: PWN 2024. ISBN: 9788301238629. URL: https://ksiegarnia.pwn.pl/Budujac-Republike-Ducha.,1070317688,p.html

Budując Republikę Ducha.

Publikacja historyczna przedstawiająca kulisy rozpoczęcia działalności Programu Fulbrighta, jednego z najbardziej prestiżowych programów stypendialnych na świecie. Autor prowadzi czytelników przez zawirowania historii i powojennej polityki, pokazując jak z czasem, w kolejnych dekadach zmieniał się sam program, nastawienie władz do niego, a także jak wpływał on na losy absolwentów.

Call for papers: Navigating Epistemic, Cultural, and Legal Translations: Processes, Hierarchies, Spaces

 Call for papers: Navigating Epistemic, Cultural, and Legal Translations: Processes, Hierarchies, Spaces - Regensburg 04/2025

Organiser: Leibniz ScienceCampus Europe and America in the Modern World (University of Regensburg & Leibniz Institute for East and Southeast European Studies)

Place: Regensburg (Germany)

Time: 23 - 25 April 2025

Deadline for Paper Proposals: 31 October 2024

All cultural, social, political and legal exchanges involve processes of transfer and translation. They include not only linguistic and cultural transfer, but also the transposition and therefore resemantization of meanings, symbols, institutions, norms, practices, and discourses across time, spaces and legal systems.

For instance, avantgarde movements, such as surrealism, as a transregional phenomenon comprising Europe and the Americas, translated cultural meaning back and forward within and between regional or linguistic contexts and artistic forms. Other processes of transfer and translations include networked social and political movements such as Latin American or East European feminisms. Legal orders – both domestic and international – are also shaped by processes of transfer and translation. Recent approaches in comparative law seek to take into account movements of norms and their contextualization. And even the language and vocabulary of international law, which is associated with the idea of universality, seems to be approached, adapted and applied differently by state and non-state actors in different locations. All these processes of cultural, social, and legal transfer and translation can be analyzed in terms of traveling ideas, practices, and aesthetics whose meanings, functions, and reception change in their new surroundings, particularly when polycentric, post-colonial, or post-imperial settings are at play.

Individual and collective actors – who navigate, renegotiate, and challenge interpretations and meanings – play important roles as intermediaries. Alongside social and cultural structures, they make transregional transfer processes interactive, interconnected, and productive. However, these processes also go hand in hand with substantial scopes for at times unexpected adaptations, contestatory re-appropriations, or creative re-translations. They evolve in contexts of local, regional and global power imbalances, cultural differences, and historical legacies of colonial or imperial inequalities, which engender frictions (Tsing), effects of mimicry (Bhabha), but also spark potential for cultural and social innovation. Hence, moving beyond the idea of translation processes conceived as uncontested one-way streets in neutral spaces, our aim is to shed light on the multifaceted implications of translation, transfer, and circulation of culturally situated knowledge and (legal) norms from different disciplinary, theoretical, and empirical perspectives.

Combining area studies-focused research in the social sciences, cultural studies, media studies, and literary studies, the conference seeks to attract a wide range of papers that analyse processes of transfer and translation in polycentric contexts. It focuses on the transatlantic entanglements of the Americas with Western and Southern Europe, and of the Americas with Eastern Europe - broadly defined to include East and East-Central Europe, Southeast Europe, the South Caucasus, and Central Asia - from the 18th century to the present. Our aim is to promote a multidisciplinary dialogue on the analysis, theoretical frameworks and broader narrativisation of transfer and translation processes.

Further information can be found in the Call for Papers, downloadable here: https://forhistiur.net/media/nachrichten/CfP_LSC_Conference_2025.pdf

online talk: Jan Surman: Cow. An Entangled History

Monday, October 14 at 15:00 CET / 9 am EDT (in person in Prague, online/zoom everywhere else).

We cordially invite you to the lecture:

Jan Jakub Surman (MÚA AV ČR): COW. AN ENTANGLED HISTORY

In the late 19th century, cattle farming in Central Europe became professionalized. This included not only new husbandry practices but also the breeding of more efficient animals. Using Polish Red Cattle in Galicia as a case study, I will discuss how this process can be described through the lens of entangled history - with a broad meaning of entanglement, ranging from intercultural to intersectional to interspecies.

Zoom link:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87087465366

Meeting ID: 870 8746 5366

In person participation

Admission free, no registration required. Masaryk Institute and Archives of the CAS, v. v. i., Gabčíkova 2362/10, Praha 8

CFP Fever: Histories of (a) Disease, c. 1750-1840

CALL FOR PAPERS

Conference: “Fever: Histories of (a) Disease, c. 1750-1840”

Organizers: Stefanie Gänger, Yijie Huang, Teresa Göltl, Jenny Sure, Lea-Marie Trigilia

Date: 10-11 July 2025

We are excited to announce the conference “Fever: Histories of (a) Disease, c. 1750-1840”, which will take place on 10-11 July 2025 at the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences. Hosted by the ERC CoG Project FEVER based at Heidelberg University, this conference seeks to bring together historians interested in fever(s), widely considered the period’s most common and fatal ailment, in societies within and tied to the Atlantic world.

While ‘fever’ in some sense speaks to a universal aspect of human sickness, its meanings, experiences, and implications varied significantly across different historical contexts. Our interest broadly includes eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century medical discourses on fever in professional and lay spheres before the advent of thermometry, and dynamic sensory experiences, emotional registers, and environmental concerns that fever constantly brought about. Our inquiry also raises important questions about the racialisation of fever in imperial contexts, the translation of febrile disease categories between different medical cultures, the dual role of fever as an epidemic and a quotidian ailment, and so forth. We seek to understand the history of fever across a wide geographical range, from typhus outbreaks in British workhouses to tertian fevers plaguing viceregal Lima and febrile threats haunting South, Southeast and East Asia.

We invite paper proposals engaging with the conference’s thematic focus on fever in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Areas of interest include the history of medicine, science and technology, as well as cultural, material, environmental, social, transregional and comparative histories. Please submit an abstract (200-250 words) and a brief academic biography by 15 December 2024 to fever.project@zegk.uni-heidelberg.de<mailto:fever.project@zegk.uni-heidelberg.de>. We are happy to cover our participants’ travel expenses (economy airfare or second-class train tickets) and provide one night's accommodation near the conference venue. We look forward to welcoming you and engaging in inspiring discussions in Heidelberg.

Dr Yijie Huang (She/her)

Postdoctoral researcher

History Department, University of Heidelberg

Grabengasse 3-5, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany

Affiliated scholar

Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge

Free School Lane, CB2 3RH Cambridge, United Kingdom

Five positions in an ERC Advanced Grant Project "Scholars, Animals, Images, Geographies and the Arts: De-exoticizing Eastern Europe in the Early Modern Period" (SAIGA)

 Five positions in an ERC Advanced Grant Project "Scholars, Animals, Images, Geographies and the Arts: De-exoticizing Eastern Europe in the Early Modern Period" (SAIGA), University of Warsaw, Poland

Project's PI: Grażyna Jurkowlaniec (https://ihs.uw.edu.pl/en/jurkowlaniec/ )

Deadline: 31 October 2024

Start Date: 1 January 2025

Duration: 57 months

Positions:

1. Assistant Professor, full time, gross monthly salary (including all bonuses): approximately PLN 16,200 (PLN 210,600 yearly) – Specialization: visual or material sources in early modern natural history

2. Assistant Professor, full time, gross monthly salary (including all bonuses): approximately PLN 16,200 (PLN 210,600 yearly) – Specialization: historical geography, 15th–19th centuries

3. Research Assistant, full time, gross monthly salary (including all bonuses): PLN 10,500 (PLN 136,500 yearly) – Specialization: art history or book history, 15th–19th centuries

4. Research Assistant, full time, gross monthly salary (including all bonuses): PLN 10,500 (PLN 136,500 yearly) – Specialization: environmental history, 15th–19th centuries

5. Research Assistant, 50% working time, gross monthly salary (including all bonuses): PLN 5,250 (PLN 68,250 yearly) – Specialization: Classical Philology or Comparative Literature

Project's Abstract:

Building on Claude Lévi-Strauss’s oft-cited claim that “animals are good to think with,” SAIGA sets out to forge a zoological trail in the understanding of Eastern Europe between the sixteenth and late eighteenth centuries. Focusing on animal representations, the project will shed new light on the role of images in the production and transfer of knowledge.

The project will highlight the region’s underrated contributions to the development of natural history by examining the overlooked Eastern European nodes in networks of scholars. By investigating various patterns of transmission of knowledge from East to West, this study will consider the vital role of Eastern informants, both trusted experts and unreliable amateurs. With animals as the primary object of investigation, the project will direct attention to the arduous processes of discovering Eastern European fauna. While some species had already been recorded by ancient authors (though seldom if ever seen), other species were only documented in the early modern period, turning Eastern Europe into a rewarding research opportunity for naturalists. Tracing the replication of images of Eastern European fauna, the project seeks to understand how early modern naturalists accounted for the discrepancies among ancient, medieval, and contemporaneous sources, and how their strategies of verification varied between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries. Mapping this knowledge transfer onto the articulation of early modern geographies—which also attempted to make sense of the regions situated between Europe and Asia—the project promises to move the study of Eastern Europe beyond the paradigm of “demi-Orientalism,” which all too often imposes a modern othering lens onto the earlier past of the region. Finally, the project will foreground the role of the arts, above all various printmaking techniques, in projecting the image of the region as an environmental and cultural landscape defined and distinguished by its animals.

Job Description:

The SAIGA project is seeking team members who will conduct independent research within the specific thematic clusters of Scholars, Animals, Images, Geographies, and the Arts, while also collaborating closely with the broader project team. Each member will be responsible for developing an individual subproject into a monograph (or a PhD dissertation for research assistants), aligned with the overarching objectives of SAIGA, which explores the role of animals, images, and knowledge transfer in Eastern Europe from the 16th to 18th centuries. In addition to their own research, team members will work collaboratively to contribute to shared goals, including the development of the URUS database (https://urus.uw.edu.pl/), conference organization, and collective publications.

Additional information about specific positions can be requested at g.jurkowlaniec@uw.edu.pl

Required Documents for Recruitment:

- Application addressed to the Rector of the University of Warsaw

- Personal questionnaire (https://bsp.adm.uw.edu.pl/wp-content/uploads/sites/18/2021/01/KWESTIONARIUSZ_OSOBOWY_KANDYDAT_11_2019_EN.docx)

- Information on personal data processing (https://bsp.adm.uw.edu.pl/wp-content/uploads/sites/18/2021/01/Klauzula-informacyjna-przy-rekrutacji-do-pracy_11_2019_EN.docx)

- Statement on primary place of employment (https://bsp.adm.uw.edu.pl/wp-content/uploads/sites/18/2021/01/oswiadczenie_podstawowe_miejsce_pracy_caly_etat-2019_EN.doc)

- (For Assistant Professor positions) Copy of the PhD diploma or other document confirming the awarding of the PhD degree

- Copies of other diplomas or certificates confirming higher education, postgraduate studies, or other courses relevant to the planned research

- Academic CV, including a list of publications

- Motivation letter in English, including a preliminary research concept (max. 5 pages) outlining your planned contribution to the SAIGA project

- Names and contact information of two referees whom the committee may contact for recommendations

- Statement confirming knowledge and acceptance of the rules for academic recruitment (https://wnks.uw.edu.pl/wydzial/struktura-wazne-dokumenty/inne-dokumenty/; English version: https://monitor.uw.edu.pl/Lists/Uchway/Attachments/5034/EN.M.2019.282.Zarz.106.pdf)

Recruitment Procedure:

The deadline for submissions is 31 October 2024, 23:59. Documents should be sent electronically to g.jurkowlaniec@uw.edu.pl as signed scans or digitally signed PDF files.

The committee will review the submitted materials, assessing both formal compliance with the announcement and substantive quality. All candidates will be notified of the results via email between 4 and 10 November 2024. Selected candidates will be invited for an online interview, scheduled between 12 and 19 November 2024. The anticipated decision date for the competition is 19 November 2024.

Note: This competition is the first stage in the process of hiring an academic teacher as outlined in the University of Warsaw Statute. A positive outcome of the competition is the basis for proceeding with the further employment process.

For additional information, please contact: g.jurkowlaniec@uw.edu.pl

CFP: Women Writing Natural Philosophy in Early Modern Europe

 CFP: Women Writing Natural Philosophy in Early Modern Europe: Spaces and Exchanges - Exeter 06/2025

The Cultures of Philosophy project at the University of Exeter in the UK invites proposals for our first conference, ‘Women Writing Natural Philosophy in Early Modern Europe: Spaces and Exchanges’ to be held at Reed Hall, the University of Exeter, 2-4 June 2025.

Women Writing Natural Philosophy in Early Modern Europe: Spaces and Exchanges

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Helena Taylor / Felicity Henderson / Catherine Evans / Carlotta Moro / Floris Verhaart, University of Exeter (University of Exeter), EX4 4PY Exeter (United Kingdom)

02.06.2025 - 04.06.2025

Deadline: 29.11.2024

Confirmed speakers:

- Cassie Gorman (Anglia Ruskin)

- Ruth Hagengruber (University of Paderborn)

- Sarah Hutton (University of York)

- Eric Jorink (Leiden University)

- Meredith Ray (University of Delaware)

- Elizabeth Scott-Baumann (KCL)

The history of philosophy is experiencing a major paradigm shift, with the work of early modern women philosophers in the spotlight (for e.g. Detlefsen and Shapiro 2023): this conference builds on that momentum to produce a more inclusive account of “science” in the long seventeenth century. The conference aims to recover women’s contributions to early modern natural philosophy, looking beyond the treatise and dialogue to other genres both in manuscript and print; and to examine women’s roles in transnational communities of scientific exchange.

In particular, the conference will foreground women’s textual engagement with natural philosophy and investigate transnational institutions, communities, and collaborations. How are philosophical concepts conveyed by diverse literary forms that cannot be categorised as scholarship? How did European women draw on global perspectives and philosophical cultures outside Europe? How can we trace women’s engagement with philosophical networks and institutions? How might including different genres, figures, and communities shift our understanding of natural philosophy in this period?

Taking a comparative, relational, and transnational approach, the conference seeks to investigate women's collaborations, exchanges, and roles in networks both within or at the margins of academies, institutions, and other official sites of scientific knowledge exchange; and their involvement in informal salons, manuscript circles, and other spaces of encounter. The CultPhil project examines the European context, but we welcome papers that engage with non-European cultures and philosophical traditions, with attention to different languages, international networks, and contexts. We encourage proposals from scholars in disciplines including (but not limited to): history of science, environmental humanities, literary history, intellectual history, book history, and the history of philosophy.

Proposals could include, but are not limited to:

- Female-authored philosophical writings that engage with natural philosophy within a range of genres, such as hagiography and other devotional genres, poetry, marginalia, miscellany, historical fiction, salon verse, annotation etc.

- Women’s participation in (and exclusion from) academies, salons, manuscript circles, institutions, and other spaces of learning

- Women and transnational and national manuscript and epistolary networks, exchanges, dynamics of collectivity and collaboration, circulatory systems, book history and their relations to natural philosophy

- Recovery of forgotten thinkers; methods for approaching the history of (natural) philosophy

- Intersections between natural philosophy and other disciplines: theology, natural history, medicine, political thought, rights of women

- Women’s ecological thought

- Ecofeminist and animal history readings of early modern texts

- Variations in women’s intellectual conditions (both constraints and opportunities) across borders and cultural regions

- Encounters, influence, entanglements with the global context

We invite proposals (200-250 words) for 20-minute papers or 10-minute lightning talks, delivered in English (please include a short biographical note of c. 50 words); we welcome proposals from PhD students and early career scholars.

Conference attendance will be free, but participants are expected to arrange and cover the costs of their own travel and accommodation. There will be a limited number of bursaries to support speakers without access to institutional funding. If you wish to be considered for a bursary, please note this with your proposal.

Deadline: November 29th 2024. Please send proposals to cultphil@exeter.ac.uk.

We envisage publishing a collected volume based on the conference proceedings.

Conference organisers (University of Exeter):

- Helena Taylor

- Felicity Henderson

- Catherine Evans

- Carlotta Moro

- Floris Verhaart

The conference is supported by the European Research Council-selected Starting Grant, ‘Cultures of Philosophy: Women Writing Knowledge in Early Modern Europe’, funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), under the UK government’s Horizon Europe funding guarantee [grant number EP/Y006372/1].

EARI-WORKSHOP: Academies between Science, Humanities, Arts and Technology

EARI-WORKSHOP: Academies between Science, Humanities, Arts and Technology. ONLINE WORKSHOP WEDNESDAY, 9 OCTOBER 2024 9.00–12.00

Program and zoom link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vFCh3zLOVPEjqHH8WUkZ8X1T2Qre4fsz/view?usp=sharing

9.00 MARTIN FRANC | PRAGUE Opening of workshop and welcome

9.15 MICHAELA ŠMIDRKALOVÁ | PRAGUE Science, Art and Architecture: Building the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences 

9.40 Questions and discussion of presentation Moderation: Giovanni Paoloni 

10.00 MARTIN ROHDE | VIENNA Ukrainian Literature and ‘National Science’ in the Shevchenko (Scientific) Society, 1873–1939 

10.25 Questions and discussion of presentation Moderation: Heiner Fangerau 

10.45 Coffee break 

11.05 MARTIN FRANC | PRAGUE Czech Academies in the 20th Century Between Science, Art and Technology 

11.30 Questions and discussion of presentation Moderation: Karl Grandin 

11.50 MARTIN FRANC | PRAGUE Summary of presentations, close of workshop

panel "Climate of Ukraine: yesterday, today, tomorrow" at the European Society for Environmental History (ESEH) 2025

 We are pleased to invite scholars to join the panel "Climate of Ukraine: yesterday, today, tomorrow" at the European Society for Environmental History (ESEH) 2025 Climate Histories Conference, taking place in Uppsala, Sweden, in August 2025.

The panel seeks to explore the historical, present, and future dimensions of climate and environmental change in Ukraine, emphasizing interdisciplinary approaches that integrate environmental history, climatology, ecology, economy, politics, and social sciences.

Panel Description:

Ukraine is underrepresented in modern climate studies, as well as in climatological studies of the Russian Empire and the Soviet era, even though its scientists conducted wide-scale research on the region's climate and one of the first meteorological stations was created on its territory.

Today, like many countries, Ukraine is experiencing the negative consequences of climate change, including rising temperatures, erratic precipitation patterns, and increasing extreme weather events such as dust storms and droughts. These environmental stressors compound the damage caused by the ongoing Russian war against Ukraine, which has ravaged ecosystems, devastated farmland, and disrupted water systems - further amplifying the country’s climate vulnerabilities. This war highlights a frequently overlooked aspect of the climate crisis: how war exacerbates environmental degradation and hinders both recovery and adaptation efforts.

This panel aims to investigate how climate change has shaped and continues to shape the region's landscapes, biodiversity, agricultural practices, economy, human development, local communities, policy-making, awareness, and adaptation models.

We encourage researchers from a variety of fields - environmental history, climate science, geography, ecology, economics, the history of science and technology, social sciences, policy, and beyond - to contribute papers that address both the theoretical and practical dimensions of the panel’s theme. Interdisciplinary approaches and projects using comparative perspectives, regional case studies, and innovative methodologies to examine the impacts of climate change in Ukraine, as well as strategies for mitigation and adaptation, are especially welcome.

Join us in discussing the past, present, and future of Ukraine’s climate and presenting this vital research to a global academic audience!

Submission Guidelines: Please submit an abstract (250-300 words) and a brief bio (150 words) to Tetiana Perga, e-mail: pergatatiana@gmail.com

Submission Deadline: September, 25, 2024.

Contact Information

For more information, please contact: Tetiana Perga, TU Berlin

e-mail: pergatatiana@gmail.com