Croatia’s Knowledge Production on Kosovo around 1989

In socialist Yugoslavia in 1989 the extremely sensitive matter of Kosovo had an ambiguous effect on the League of Communists of Croatia, which was then still caught in the so-called “Croatian silence”. It did however provoke much turbulence in the Croatian media, which made pointed comments on the larger Yugoslav crisis, on the situation in Kosovo, and on the politics of Serbian president Slobodan Milošević. An intense dynamic could be also found in the field of knowledge production which encompassed scholars, historians, and intellectuals. Who produced knowledge about Kosovo? What were their political and intellectual agendas? How did they intervene in the dominant discourses and media coverage, what debates and reactions did they spark? Within the frames of the history of knowledge, the history of books and intellectual history, the author here assesses the works on Kosovo of a number of Croatian and Yugoslav intellectuals, chiefly Darko Hudelist and Branko Horvat.

Down to Earth: History and philosophy of geoscience in practice for undergraduate education

Undergraduate geoscience students are rarely exposed to history and philosophy of science (HPS). I will describe the experiences with a short course unfavourably placed in the first year of a bachelor of earth science. Arguments how HPS could enrich their education in many ways are sketched. One useful didactic approach is to develop a broader interest by connecting HPS themes to practical cases throughout the curriculum, and develop learning activities that allow students to reflect on their skills, methods and their field in relation to other disciplines and interactions with society with abilities gained through exposure to HPS. Given support of the teaching staff, the tenets of philosophy of science in practice, of conceptual history of knowledge, and of ethics of science for society can fruitfully and directly be connected to the existing curriculum. This is ideally followed by a capstone HPS course late in the bachelor programme.

De BMGN en de kennisgeschiedenis

Kennisgeschiedenis is in de BMGN nu beter vertegenwoordigd dan dertig jaar geleden. Dat betekent niet dat de toenadering tussen kennisgeschiedenis en algemene geschiedenis in dit tijdschrift al volledig is geslaagd, en evenmin dat alle beschikbare kansen zijn benut. Kennisgeschiedenis is in de BMGN geen mainstream geworden, zo wordt in deze bijdrage betoogd, en de toenadering komt tot nu toe vooral van één kant. De mogelijkheden voor kennishistorisch onderzoek over nationale grenzen heen worden bovendien maar mondjesmaat verkend. De meeste artikelen blijven immers tot één helft van de Lage Landen beperkt. Aan de hand van verschillende voorbeelden wordt geïllustreerd welke interessante connecties en belangwekkende vergelijkingen tussen Noord en Zuid zouden kunnen worden onderzocht. De BMGN zou dus voor de kennisgeschiedenis meer kunnen betekenen dan zij in de afgelopen halve eeuw heeft gedaan. History of knowledge is better represented at the BMGN nowadays than it was thirty years ago. This does not mean that a complete rapprochement between history of knowledge and general history has been accomplished in this journal, nor have all available opportunities been explored. History of knowledge has not become a mainstream school of thought in the BMGN, as is argued in this contribution, and to date the effort at rapprochement has been largely one-sided. Moreover, opportunities for research on history of knowledge beyond national borders are explored in very limited measure. After all, most articles continue to address only one half of the Low Countries. Various examples are presented here to illustrate which interesting connections and impressive comparisons could be examined between North and South. The BMGN could thus have done more to promote history of knowledge than it has in the past half century.