STEP - Science and Technology in the European Periphery

Call for Papers: Communicating Science and Technology II: From the 15th century to the present, Paris, 9th & 10th March 2012
The Second annual Anglo-French Conference on Scientific Communication and its History will take place in Paris at the Ecole Normale Supérieure, 45 rue d’Ulm, on 9th & 10th March 2012.
Technological developments—from the invention of printing with movable type to the postal network, from the railway timetable to the electric telegraph, from the telephone to e-mail—have profoundly influenced the nature of scientific communication and the structure and practice of science. This conference will bring together scientists, historians, social scientists and science communicators to explore the role of technologies, both physical and social, in the history and present practice of communication within and around scientific communities and between science and its various publics.
The conference will be organised around four themes: print and text; correspondence; networks and gatherings; non-print media. In each of these we will explore the interaction between technical change and communicative practice by considering examples taken from across a wide range of historical conjunctures and disciplines. Examples of issues that could be discussed are:
Print and Text
The transition from manuscript to print-based communities and practices; popular press and the scientific journalist; printing technology, scientific journals and the emergence of disciplines; electronic texts, authorship and new modes of publication; translation and transmission.
Correspondence
The role of the corresponding secretary in early scientific societies; centre and periphery; 18th-century postal networks and the transmission of knowledge; email and accountability.
Networks and gatherings
Science and sociability—courts and salons, cabinets of curiosity and coffee houses; organising the first international conferences; the advancement of science movement, leisure and the railway; network formation and the structuring of research.
Non-print media
Surveying, observing and telegraphic communication; science in film, film in science; radio and television science journalism; social media and the anti-science movement.
The organising committee invites proposals for papers, which should be 30 minutes in length, and should fall within one of the four themes. Doctoral students are invited to give shorter (15 minute) papers. Papers can focus on a detailed case study or adopt a broader and more synthetic approach. Proposals, of up to 300 words, should be sent to : muriel.le.roux@ens.fr

Deadline: 15 January 2012. ENGLISH AND FRENCH ARE THE LANGUAGES CONFERENCE
Funding for travel and accommodation will be available, in particular for doctoral students.
Concerning the first conference see: (http://www.mfo.ac.uk/en/node/1360)

Organising Committee: Muriel Le Roux, ENS/IHMC, Paris - Maison Française d’Oxford ,Serge Plattard, French Embassy, London, Jeanne Peiffer, Centre Koyré, Paris, Luc Borot, Maison Française d’Oxford, Pietro Corsi, Oxford University, Perkins, Oxford Brookes University, Robert Fox, Oxford University, Viviane Quirke Oxford Brookes University, Chrisotphe Charle, ENS/IHMC, Paris
Muriel Le Roux
Chargee de recherche au CNRS
Senior Research Fellow at the CNRS,
History of Science & Technology
IHMC - Institut d'histoire moderne et contemporaine, CNRS/ENS
ENS, 45 rue d'Ulm, 75005 Paris, France
+33 1 44 32 31 52
muriel.le.roux@ens.fr
http://www.mfo.ac.uk/en/about/people/muriel-le-roux