Perspectives is an ever-growing library of podcasts, videos, and essays on the history of science, technology and medicine, along with resources for further learning and opportunities to engage in ongoing conversations.
Perspectives provides discussions with leading scholars, interviews with recent authors, and archival highlights from the exceptional collections of Consortium member institutions.
Courtney Thompson and Alicia Puglionesi discuss their books on the history of phrenology and psychical science in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century America.
Watch Peter Galison as he discusses his latest film with esteemed colleagues Lorraine Daston and Simon Schaffer, and then answers questions about the film from friends of the Consortium.
Abraham Gibson explores the history of the Southern United States through its feral animal populations, providing us with an understanding of how domestication and the wild have informed each other over the last four hundred years.
Bert Hansen guides us through his donated collection of images of medical treatments and technologies found in nineteenth century mass media publications.
Join us as we speak to historian Wendy Gonaver about her research on the history of the Eastern Lunatic Asylum in Williamsburg, Virginia and the practice of psychiatry in the pre- and post-Civil War American South.
Listen to historian Audra Wolfe as she examines how science was defined and used as a tool of cultural diplomacy and international relations during the Cold War.
Listen to historian Susan Lindee as she discusses how the military establishment transformed science and technology, interrogates why the victims of technologies of war are often left out of our historical accounts, and questions whether growing defense budgets are in society's best interests.
Scholars Dean Jamison and Abdo Yazbeck discuss the creation and impact of the World Bank's World Development Report 1993: Investing in Health, an influential document in the history of global health that they helped to create. They discuss and answer questions about the economization of health, the creation of the DALY measure, and the benefits and downsides of the World Bank's role in international health policy.
Jonson Miller explores the development of the Virginia Military Institute and the engineering profession in the Antebellum United States. Miller delves into the ways in which VMI was a node in the struggle for political representation among lower- and middle-class white men, while explicitly excluding women and black men from its egalitarian mission.
Follow along with Professor Mary Fissell as she discusses her research on Aristotle's Masterpiece, a late 17th century English sex and midwifery manual.
Scholars Deirdre Cooper Owens and Lynn Roberts discuss how slavery and the history of reproductive medicine intersect, the impact of medical racism on Black birthing people, and recent efforts to address racial inequalities in maternal mortality and morbidity.
Join the Presidents of the History of Science Society, the Society for the History of Technology, and the American Association for the History of Medicine as they discuss the current and future roles of the three most important organizations in our field. Jan Golinski (HSS), Tom Misa (SHOT), and Keith Wailoo (AAHM) discuss how their organizations are faring, how they are changing, and how we can participate in, benefit from, and help to shape them.
Listen to this series of perspectives on the COVID-19 pandemic from renowned scholars in the humanities and social sciences. There are currently twelve episodes in the series, looking at COVID-19 and its historical antecedents from diverse viewpoints and in places such as India, Brazil, China, Iran, South Africa, and the United States.
Beginning with an in-depth look at Johannes Stradanus's Nova Reperta, explore the interplay between invention, social change, and economic development from the Renaissance to today.
Joseph Martin tells the story of how solid state physics challenged and redefined some of the core ideals of American physics, and in the process played an essential role in sustaining the prestige physics enjoyed in Cold War American society.
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Coming Soon!