Histories, Volume 2, Issue 3 (September 2022) – 13 articles

This article examines how British imperial historians of the early twentieth century, the zenith of the colonial era, approached the writing of British colonial women into their histories. In the early nineteenth century, hundreds of British women went out to the British colonies in Southeast Asia, yet to date, their stories and experiences have largely been neglected by historians. In general, the nature of the imperial project, with its emphasis on masculinist values of conquest, territorial expansionism and despotic administration, left little scope for the inclusion of women’s experiences and contributions in its histories. This article focuses closely on how British historians of the period of high imperialism approached writing about two prominent women, the wives of an imperialist hero, Stamford Raffles. It shows how conventional assumptions about women were entangled with prevailing gendered ideologies, such as the madonna/whore stereotypes, which in turn were enmeshed with notions concerning Orientalism, class and race. The result was a deeply ambivalent portrayal of these colonial women, which awkwardly brought together divergent elements of sexual scandal, wifely devotion, literary achievement, delicate health, career promotion, emotional care taking and judgments about beauty. These positionings tell us more about contemporary cultural discourses than they do about the women themselves. Full article

The history of imperial science has been a growing topic over recent decades. Overviews of the imperial history of science have rarely included the Russian, Habsburg, and German empires. The history of Central and Eastern Europe has embraced empire as an analytical and critical category only recently, having previously pursued national historiographies and romanticised versions of imperial pasts. This article highlights several key narratives of imperial sciences in Central and Eastern Europe that have appeared over the past twenty years, especially in anglophone literature. Interdependence between national and imperial institutions and biographies, the history of nature as an interplay of scales, and finally, the histories of imagining a path between imperialism and nationalism, demonstrate how the history of imperial science can become an important part of the discussion of Central European history from a global perspective, as well as how the history of science can be factored into the general history of this region. Finally, I argue that the imperial history of science can play an important role in re-thinking the post/decolonial history of Central and Eastern Europe, an issue that, since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, has become the centre of intellectual attention. Full article

This article sums up recent developments in the history of mathematics. The range of mathematics considered has considerably broadened, expanding well beyond the traditional field of original research. As new topics have been brought under consideration, methodologies borrowed from neighboring academic fields have been fruitfully put into use. In the first section, we describe how well-known questions—about the concept of proof and the nature of algebra—have been reconsidered with new questions and analytical concepts. We then sketch up some of the new research topics, among others the history of mathematical education, the inclusion of actors previously neglected, and the prominent role of bureaucracies in the cultural development of mathematics. The last section briefly retraces the development of the Zilsel thesis as a case study illustrating the previous points. Introduced in the mid-20th century, the theory that early modern craftsmen once played a decisive role in the mathematization of nature has recently led to very diverse fruitful studies about the nature and development of mathematical knowledge. Full article

Science communication has been central to our understanding of Modern Europe, and it also plays an important role in other parts of the world. The aim of this article is to present key narratives—histories—about the development of science communication in Modern Europe and beyond. Surveying key contributions, the article identifies two main narratives about science communication in Modern Europe: one about widening gaps between science and the public (informational, epistemological, and moral gaps) and one about building bridges through dialogue, engagement, and participation. Beyond Modern Europe, the same narratives appear but often with important twists. The discussion about science communication in Latin America, for example, includes colonial and postcolonial dimensions, whereas the narrative about science communication (science popularization) in China emphasizes the embeddedness of science communication in national politics. Together, the histories show that science communication is not the diminutive or distorted form of science but rather the sum of social conversations around science. Full article

This paper examines a 12th-century Virupaksha temple through the reconstruction and exploration of space, movement, devotee corporeal experiences, and the use of natural landscape microtopographic features in monument design. The Mula Virupaksha Temple presents a dramatic change in the previously non-imperial sacred landscape in the Hemakuta Hill area at Hampi (Bellary District, Karnataka). With its construction, Hampi transitioned from a local Shaiva pilgrimage center dedicated to the river goddess Pampa and her counterpart Bhairava to a popular Shaiva pilgrimage and cult center of the newly imported god, Virupaksha. The Mula Virupaksha Temple presents a design thoroughly novel to the area that ushered in a period of sophisticated and unprecedented architectural planning at the site which incorporated natural landscape features for the management and cultivation of devotee ritual corporeal experiences. Virupaksha, his patrons, and associated artisans brought significant cultic change and architectural innovation that took root and persisted into the imperial Vijayanagara period, from the mid-14th to late 16th centuries. The present paper relies on a digital methodology developed to identify ritual changes in early medieval South Asian sacred spaces, focusing on time-sensitive maps created through a geographic information system (GIS), and coupled with the immersive panoramic capabilities of Google Street View (GSV) for a ground-based investigation of the non-ephemeral pilgrimage landscape features. Full article

The development of Chinese cemetery hills in Singapore reflects the changing dominance of the dialect groups between the 19th and 20th centuries. Heng San Ting 恒山亭 is the earliest cemetery hill of the Hokkien dialect group, and newly excavated burials indicate that early Singaporean Hokkien came not only from Zhangzhou 漳州 and Quanzhou 泉州 in southern Fujian 福建, but also from places such as Yongchun 永春 from the interior of Fujian. Apart from the Hokkien dialect group, the Cantonese 广东, Hakka 客家, Teochew 潮州 and Hainan 海南 communities also established their cemetery hills. In the early 19th century, the Chinese communities were divided into different dialect groups to form their representative cemetery hills, but the smaller communities within the dialect groups started to form and develop their own cemeteries due to increasing economic power from the mid to late 19th century. Scholars generally believe that the other four dialect groups, led by the Cantonese and Hakka dialect groups, formed a “United Front 联合阵线” to confront the Hokkien dialect group. However, this paper looks at the smaller communities under the five dialect groups and discovers that these communities developed and maintained their own cemetery hills and communicated with the smaller communities from different dialect groups. It was not a direct confrontation. In the 20th century, although the government introduced a series of policies to restrict the development of Chinese burial mounds, the different communities retained their autonomy under the government’s policies. From the development and changes of the Chinese dialect group cemeteries in Singapore, we see that the Chinese community still retains its own autonomy despite the rapid changes of society and the change of times. Full article

In recent years, numerous changes have emerged in the History of Science of what has traditionally been called the Islamic world. By now, it has become usual to speak of the Islamicate world, albeit more so in Islamic Studies and related historical disciplines. The notion Islamicate wishes to express that the societies rule by Muslim dynasties were multi-cultural, multi-ethnic, multi-confessional and plurilingual. Different Muslim denominations could form majority but also minority groups. The processes of change in the study of the sciences in those societies can be summarized as efforts to pluralize research approaches and to historicize objects, themes, people, institutions and practices. The pluralization of approaches includes the multiplication of (1) modern disciplinary homes for studies of scientific topics dealt with in Islamicate societies, (2) the languages acknowledged as languages of scientific texts such as New Persian, Ottoman Turkish or Urdu worthwhile to analyze, (3) the number of historical disciplines accepted under the umbrella of history of science, (4) the centuries or periods as well as the regions that have been incorporated into the investigation of past scientific knowledge and (5) the recognition that more than a single history can and should be told about the sciences in past Islamicate societies. The process of historicization means, first and foremost, to turn away from macro-units of research (Islam, medieval or Arabic science) to medium- or micro-level units. Historicization indicates, secondly, the turn toward contextualization beyond the analysis of individual texts or instruments. And thirdly, it signifies the integration of features or aspects of scholarly practices that are not limited to the content of a discipline or a text but include layouts, the organization of text production, types of visualizations of knowledge or rhetorical strategies and paratextual elements. My paper reports on trends that I consider relevant for understanding how the field changed over the last decades and how it ticks today. But it does not try to be comprehensive. Full article

The ubiquity and yet distinctiveness of domestic sites for scientific research have attracted an unprecedented focus in recent years, especially in studies concerned with the gendering of science and the rise of citizen science movements of the late twentieth century. It is fair to say this “new” subfield has now entered a stage of maturity, even as it continues to grow and adopt new theoretical perspectives. Following an historiographical shift we might call the “domestic turn” in histories of science, “domesticities” emerges as a critical, analytical lens through which to view scientific developments in a range of historical contexts globally. The emphasis in the literature has moved from one on the “house of experiment” to one on the “laboratory of domesticity”, attending particularly to the permeability, plasticity, portability, and plurality of instances of entanglement between domesticities and science. In view of the emergence of new empirical cases and theoretical perspectives, this paper revisits the status of domesticities within histories of science to consider the current status of the historiography and to suggest even further directions for new research. Full article

This study examines the temple networks of the 19th-century Chinese community leader See Boon Tiong （薛文仲） in Singapore and Malacca in order to cognize his rising influence in both places. In the early years of his career in Singapore, See Boon Tiong expanded his social networks by founding the Keng Teck Whay （庆德会）, as well as through his active involvement in the affairs of Chinese temples. In 1848, the Keng Teck Whay, represented by See Boon Tiong, precipitated the establishment of the Cheng Wah Keong Temple （清华宫） in Malacca and the organization of the “Wangchuan” （王船） Ceremony, thereby consolidating See’s leadership in the local Chinese community. This also provides insights into the process of the reconstitution of power by the Malaccan Chinese merchants in their hometown after forging social networks in Singapore. In the 1850s, See’s influence, exerted through these networks, further penetrated Cheng Hoon Teng Temple （青云亭）in Malacca, outstripping the authority and influence of Tengzhu （亭主） Tan Kim Seng （陈金声）, and engendered the dominance of the Hokkien Zhangzhou （漳州） group to which he belonged. The biography of See Boon Tiong is a microcosm of the strategies which ethnic Chinese leaders in Southeast Asia in the 19th Century deployed to amalgamate and cement their power and influence in society. This also exemplifies the interplay and inseparability between the leadership of the Chinese communities in Singapore and Malacca, and highlights the influential role and agency of these power networks behind the temples in transforming the power structure of the Chinese community in that era. Full article

In European thought, the relationship among the fields of psychology, education, and health is both complex and obscured. Foucault’s acclaimed work, The Order of Things, offers a framework to evaluate their interconnection by identifying three distinct periods of European thought since the 16th century, with respect to the ordering of phenomena—Renaissance, Classical, and Modern. Theoretically dense and often difficult to decipher, the book’s categorization of language, value, and being has been understandably underused, yet it provides deep insights into what have come to be known as psychology, education, and health, and remains invaluable in understanding the origin, limits, and consequences of these fields. Investigated is how Foucault’s analysis can be interpreted, concerning the development of these areas in each of the three periods of European thought. An approach based on narrative research appraises the analysis offered in the book. The results, presented for the first time in table form, compare these three periods, demonstrating a continuing practical value to Foucault’s insights. With the aid of the framework presented by these tables, the boundaries and relationship of psychology, education, and health become clear, and their limitations—plus potential solutions to them—can be identified to mitigate anticipated negative consequences. Full article

This study argues that democracy can, at times, undermine a peace process. Israel’s ‘overly’ democratic nature detracted from the potential success of the official peace process, from Oslo to Camp David, since its democratic–bureaucratic system diminished the influence of the moderate public opinion and vote. This argument is examined over two integrated and almost parallel timelines: the official peace process from 1991 to 2000 and Israel’s change in electoral systems from 1992 to 2001. This study is the first to integrate these two processes—negotiations and elections—in a single empirical approach. I conclude that while the Israeli public shifted from a negative to a positive stance toward a Palestinian state, the Israeli government shifted in the opposite direction, from the success of Oslo to the failure of Camp David. Original electoral findings were analyzed after a personal visit to the Israeli Knesset. Full article

In the past thirty years or so, the history of the social sciences since 1945 has become a more diverse research area. In addition to social scientists who write the histories of individual disciplines, a number of historians are now interested in the recent past of the social sciences, whose efforts emphasize extradisciplinary concerns. The time is gone, however, when this distinction could be summarized by the different approaches of disciplinary histories on the one hand and intellectual history on the other. Disciplinary historians have gone beyond disciplinary concerns and intellectual historians have paid more attention to the latter. More generally, a variety of historians have pointed out the role of social scientific ideas in the transformations of Western societies after World War II and noted the impact of these transformations on social science disciplines themselves. Finally, in the past twenty years, histories of recent social science have experienced a transnational turn. Full article

Max Weber ended the metaphysics of the state just as Nietzsche had ended the meta-physics of being. However, Weber was building on the theories of the historian Heinrich von Treitschke and the constitutional scholar Georg Jellinek. Weber replaced Jellinek’s legal formalism and Treitschke’s nationalism with a new type of politics. This was the politics of responsibility, which eliminated the metaphysical concept of the state and was replaced by a dynamic approach to legitimate political leadership. Full article