Working Groups

Seminar with Katharina Seidl (Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna / Ambras Castle, Innsbruck) on the "The Art of Beauty exhibition" at Ambras Castle, Innsbruck (June-October 2025) and related exhibitions

Collaborative Research on Mining I: Roundtable with Pamela Smith & Daviken Studnicki-Gizbert 

Daviken Studnicki-Gizbert (McGill University): Historical research within the field of contemporary extractivist politics: observations from collaborations in Mexico, Panama, and Québec.  

Josephine Musil-Gutsch (FAU), "Assyriology, Chemistry and the Glass Texts: The Material History of Translation (1920-1970)"

Please join us for a discussion of Josephine's work-in-progress, which can help us understand the materiality of linguistic archives. Her abstract is as follows:

This meeting is cancelled for the 11 November holiday. See you in December! 

Steven French "From a Lost History to a New Future: Is a Phenomenological Approach to Quantum Physics Viable?"

With a primary source: London and Bauer "The Theory of Observation in Quantum Mechanics"

Kilian Laclavetine (Centre for Research and Restoration of Museums of France), on 'Study of the Manufacture of 15th Century Italian Tarot Cards with a Non-Invasive Methodology'

"Orifices: Surgery and sodomy in early modern Rome"

Silvia De Renzi (Open University)
Response: Sheena McKeever (Columbia)

Robert Lifset, “A City Built By and On Oil: The March of the Mud hogs and Derricks in Depression-Era Oklahoma City”

Christèle Barois (CESAH)

Embryogenesis narratives and the history of ancient Indian medicine

For this meeting we will read the following articles, all of which I have combined into the PDF at the bottom of this page.

Hung, Kuang‐chi. “Alien Science, Indigenous Thought and Foreign Religion: Reconsidering the Reception of Darwinism in Japan.” Intellectual History Review 19, no. 2 (2009): 231–50. https://doi.org/10.1080/17496970902981702.

ONCE AGAIN ITS TIME FOR OUR NOVEMBER SPECIAL: Focus Session
Looking forward to 2026 a new year filled with enthusiasm, inspiration and perspectives on early color photography, Janine & Hanin  will present  an informal session organized as follows:

Sonya Schoenberger, Stanford University, "Enclosing the Sea: Marine Resource Sovereignty and the Rise of 'Large Ocean States' in the Postwar Pacific"

In this session, we will read and discuss Mariano Zarowsky's working paper (here in both English and Spanish versions): “New York, Santiago, París: las conexiones transnacionales de Seth Siegelaub, un editor marxista (1972-1991)”  and “New York, Santiago, Paris: The Transnational Connections of Seth Siegelaub, a Marxist Publisher (1972-1991).” The session will feature English and Spanish simultaneous interpretation.

Speaker: Lauren MacIvor Thompson, Kennesaw State University

Format: Chapter Workshop 

Minji Lee (Montclair State University), 'The Porous Womb: Hildegard’s Understanding of the Female Body Giving New Life and Salvation'

Biography:
Dr. Minji Lee is an Assistant Professor in Religion and the Medical Humanities Program at Montclair State University. Dr. Lee specializes in the study of medicine in relation to cultural practices and belief systems – including women’s health, reproductive issues, and comparative analysis of alternative medicine in Korea and the West.

Taina Syrjämaa

Tracing ticks and a multispecies network in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Finland

Ticks have probably lived for centuries in the Finnish territory. However, their exact distribution was not mapped before the 1950s and only few overt traces of them exist in historical sources. For example, oral history collections contain hardly any reference directly to them. My search for ticks in rural nineteenth and early twentieth century Finland started with the dilemma of ticks’ invisibility in the then society.

Geoff Bil (University of Victoria)

NOTE SPECIAL TIME

Reading seminar with Erin Griffey (University of Auckland) on her book Facing Decay: Beauty, Aging and Cosmetics in Early Modern Europe (Penn State University Press, 2025)

From the Margins to the Center: A Multidisciplinary Approach to Understanding (Soviet/ Radio) Astronomy and the State

led by Gabriela Rădulescu, Postdoctoral Guggenheim Fellow, Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum
 

We are excited to announce that Caleb Shelburne (Harvard University) will join us in December to discuss "Teaching Resources at the History of Anthropology Review." Teaching Resources at the History of Anthropology Review."