Carving Coconuts, the Philosophy of Drawing Rooms, and the Politics of Dates: Grant Allen, Popular Scientific Journalism, Evolution, and Culture in the Cornhill Magazine

Author(s):  
David Amigoni
Author(s):  
Lena Wånggren

This book examines late nineteenth-century feminism in relation to technologies of the time, marking the crucial role of technology in social and literary struggles for equality. The New Woman, the fin de siècle cultural archetype of early feminism, became the focal figure for key nineteenth-century debates concerning issues such as gender and sexuality, evolution and degeneration, science, empire and modernity. While the New Woman is located in the debates concerning the ‘crisis in gender’ or ‘sexual anarchy’ of the time, the period also saw an upsurge of new technologies of communication, transport and medicine. This book explores the interlinking of gender and technology in writings by overlooked authors such as Grant Allen, Tom Gallon, H. G. Wells, Margaret Todd and Mathias McDonnell Bodkin. As the book demonstrates, literature of the time is inevitably caught up in a technological modernity: technologies such as the typewriter, the bicycle, and medical technologies, through literary texts come to work as freedom machines, as harbingers of female emancipation.


Publications ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 28
Author(s):  
Jon Ander Garibi ◽  
Alvaro Antón ◽  
José Domingo Villarroel

The present study examines a sample of 220 pieces of news related to human evolution, written in Spanish and published over a period of two years, both in digital and print media. The aim of this study is to assess the rigor and coherence of the information in the news in our sample with scientific knowledge on the theory of evolution. To this end, errors and the incorrect use of concepts related to biological evolution are identified, classified according to criteria resulting from the review of previous studies, and finally, the frequency of errors identified in news published in print media is compared with that identified in digital media. The results presented allow us to highlight the significantly high frequency of errors in the news analyzed and the most frequent error categories. Results are discussed within the frame of the important role that scientific journalism plays in the processes of knowledge dissemination, in this case, related to human evolution.


1938 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 675-676
Author(s):  
The Editor

Richard Phillips, the son of a well-known London printer and book-seller, was trained as a chemist and druggist under William Allen, F. R. S. Phillips was a breezy, able and versatile chemist who left his mark in pharmaceutical chemistry, in mineralogy and in scientific journalism. In addition he held a number of teaching posts and he was his colleagues’ first choice as President of the Chemical Society when it was founded in 1841. Phillips declined the honour but later was elected President in 1849. He rendered conspicuous services to pharmacy by his accurate and incisive criticisms of the London Pharmacopoeia in 1811 and his advice was sought about subsequent editions. He was a well-known mineral analyst and in 1823 he discovered the nature of uraninite. His interest in minerals no doubt led to his appointment in 1839 as chemist and curator of the Museum of Practical Geology in Jermyn Street, a position he held until his death in 1851. Phillips lectured on chemistry at the London Hospital and at Grainger’s School of Medicine in Southwark and was also Professor of Chemistry at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. Under his joint editorship with Brayley of the Annals of Philosophy from 1821 onwards and later of the Philosophical Magazine with which it was merged, the Annals became an influential scientific journal. In addition to original communications, it contained reprints of important scientific papers, many of them translations from foreign journals, and also excellent summaries of scientific progress. Phillips was a friend and admirer of Michael Faraday and in 1821 he, fortunately for science, directed Faraday’s attention to electromagnetism by asking him to contribute a series of articles on this new field of investigation following on Oersted’s discovery of the effect of an electric current on a magnetic needle in 1819.


1964 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Kent

SynopsisProfessor Thomson had been a typical Scottish ‘lad o’ pairts'. Deservant of repute as teacher, scientist, editor and historian, his most distinctive achievements were in scientific journalism and propaganda. These were powerfully exhibited in the interests of Dalton's Atomism and of Prout's Hypothesis—and in university politics.His work for Chambers' Encyclopaedia and for Nicholson's Journal was influential and effective. His textbooks gained an international esteem and each successive edition was kept up to date.Much of his professional outlook and experience is expressed in his History of Chemistry (2 vols. 1830–31). Researches in his old Department at Glasgow on his choice and use of material provide the main topics of this Address. These volumes are still important.


1900 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 5
Author(s):  
Robert Allen
Keyword(s):  

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