Engineering space in the nineteenth century:
environment, science, technology and the transformation of space.
Environmental history has arisen as a historical discipline in the wake of post-1960’s environmentalism. Consequently, it has embraced a transnational perspective: although nation states are fundamentally important in addressing environmental issues, the global ecological commons requires a world civic political perspective. Innovations in overseas travel and communication have played a significant historical role in fostering global environmental consciousness.
St Andrews School of History is uniquely placed to explore the complex historical relationships between nation-building, technological science, environment, and transnational politics. Past historical analyses have focused on the relationships between nation, nationalism and nation-building in relation to the role of print and other media, history and tradition, and the rise of technocracy. In addition, historians of science have examined space through a Foucauldian lens to understand the sites of knowledge production and the power relationships that lay behind them.
Less well studied has been the role of environment in relation to new sciences and technologies that were applied to transform nature and to master space to create more coherent territorial – or even national – entities. In parts of empire, such as Canada or Tsarist Russia, railways and utilitarian science were at the heart of ‘inventing a nation’ and transforming imperial spaces. In nineteenth-century Britain, railways were initially seen as scars upon the landscape by nascent environmentalists. After the explosion in automobile ownership and motorway building in the twentieth century, the railway has been reassessed by historians as environmentally benign.
This workshop will examine technologies, such as railway, canal, cartography, and telegraphy, which served state administration in order to foster the control of people, populations, and environment. Furthermore, the workshop asks to what extent these techniques were applied on national as well as transnational levels in order to transform past heterogeneous, fragmented spaces into more coherent, territorial (national or imperial) spaces. Therefore, the timeframe will be principally (but not exclusively) a “short” nineteenth century, from 1830 to 1914.
Guiding questions include
- To what extent were science and technology used to “master” space?
- What were the spatial units the state and bureaucracy intended to transform via technology and science?
- What determined the use of new technologies to master space: political, economic, social aspects?
- What is the role of private enterprise and economic interest in the shaping of new spaces in the nineteenth century?
- To what extent did the environment shape national commitments to particular technologies?
- To what extent did new technologies – first used to foster state-building internally – create new transnational spaces by intensifying cross-border communication?
Deadline for proposals 10 March 2009
Please send proposals of no more than two pages as well as a brief biographical note to Bernhard Struck, bs50@st-andrews.ac.uk
Conditions
All speakers will be accommodated at New Hall, University of St Andrews for the nights of 3, 4, and 5 September 2009. All meals will be provided for 4 and 5 September. We shall cover the costs of these arrangements.
In addition, we shall pay travel expenses, under the following conditions:
For international speakers: flights to Scotland and travel to and from venue within Scotland. For UK speakers: travel to and from venue.
Venue: University of St Andrews, 4-5 September 2009
Organizers:
Dr John Clark jfc2@st-andrews.ac.uk
Dr Bernhard Struck bs50@st-andrews.ac.uk
University of St Andrews
School of History
Institute for Environmental History
Transnational History at St Andrews