Dear BSHS Member
I hope you’ve had a summer that has been productive, relaxing, memorable and enjoyable–with luck all of these. For those involved with the BSHS it has been remarkably busy, though as usual things have been quieter in August.
Certainly a highlight of the summer was our meeting in the beautiful Welsh coastal town of Aberystwyth on the 10th through 12th of July. The conference featured some 120 papers from across Britain and many other parts of Europe and the rest of the world, with a uniformly high standard across the board. The meeting also included a fascinating and sometimes challenging talk by one of the UK’s top science programme producers, Elin Rhys, ‘Why bother with science on screen?’ The talk was delivered in Welsh with simultaneous translation. The wonderful conference awards dinner–featuring delicious local produce–was one of the most impressive I can remember. The Pickstone Prize, awarded every two years to the best academic book in the field, was won by Matthew Eddy for Media and the Mind: Art, Science, and Notebooks as Paper Machines, 1700-1830, published by the University of Chicago Press in 2023.
Best of all, I found the meeting was genuinely fun. And how many academic conferences do you attend that feature dancing and stand-up comedy?
Putting these meetings together is a huge task, and the society is particularly grateful to Sam Robinson and his great team, who assembled an amazing programme and kept things on track And also Iwan Morus, Mandy Rees and their family for local organization and hospitality. Many of you will also have benefited from other recent meetings supported by BSHS, including the big international gathering in Halifax, Nova Scotia.on ‘Circulating Knowledge’. And don’t forget the workshop on climate on 30 August at the University of Manchester!
Our next annual summer meeting will be in Cambridge from 8th to 10th July 2025, in association with the Department of History and Philosophy of Science. Put the dates in your diary, and watch out for the call for papers later this year!
On other news, you should have all received a copy of the latest issue of our triannual magazine Viewpoint, with articles on topics ranging the history of the internet to butterflies and plague. A special feature is a fascinating interview with Ryan Sweet, a specialist in disability studies at the University of Swansea. Thanks to Joe Holloway, our new editor, for putting it all together.
As many of you will know, it’s been a difficult summer for our publisher, Cambridge University Press. A hacking incident three months ago has delayed the appearance of the June and subsequent issues of the British Journal for the History of Science. It has also held up completion of the current volume of our online journal, BJHS Themes. This is on ‘The Big Picture’, and should be of wide interest. Despite the delays, many of the articles for that issue are already available on FirstView: https://www.cambridge.org/
On the positive front, the Press tells us that the difficulties should be sorted out fairly soon. Articles you submit are still being considered for publication and sent out to reviewers, and all our existing content is accessible for use. And the best news is that all research articles accepted from the end of October for the journal will appear as open access, without any pay-to-say fees or other charges even for those without an academic affiliation. This means, of course, that anyone in the world will be able to read your scholarship without a paywall. To my knowledge, we are the very first of the top history of science journals to offer full open access in this way.
As readers of my previous letters will know, I’ve been eager to increase the numbers benefiting from BSHS membership. The good news is that our total membership has increased over the past two years, in part because our offer of a first year of membership at the concessionary rate (for students, early career academics, and the unwaged) of only £10. We’ll be running a campaign this autumn to encourage new members, especially among the incoming postgraduate cohort. So do encourage all your students to join–and also have a chat with any of your colleagues who have committed the fundamental category mistake of failing to join their national society.
I’ve now had the honour of leading the BSHS for two years, and so as of 1 September I’ve stepped down as president. We have the great good fortune that the BSHS is excellent hands, as Chiara Ambrosio of University College London has taken over as my successor.
I can hardly say how grateful I am for all the work everyone puts in to make the Society a success.
all best wishes
Jim Secord (BSHS President)
P. S. Here’s a message you can share with students or friends who might be interested:
Are you a Masters or PhD student whose work touches on the history of science, technology or medicine? If so, we invite you to find your academic home in the British Society for the History of Science.
Introductory student membership of the BSHS is just £10 per year, and for this small sum you can expect …
· Access to research and engagement grants
· Access to funding to organise your own mini-conference or workshop
· Opportunity to publish in our colourful magazine Viewpoint
· Full participation in our friendly and supportive annual conferences
· An additional annual conference just for postgraduates
· Workshops and events on academic skills and careers (within and beyond academia)
· A supportive community of colleagues at all career stages to help you build your professional network
· A network of like-minded postgraduates
· Access to our world-leading journals BJHS and BJHS Themes
Former student members say:
“Without that grant, I could never have finished my PhD.”
“The best workshop I’ve been to recently was a one-day event sponsored by the BSHS.”
“My colleagues in my own department weren’t interested in my research, but everybody welcomed me at the BSHS.”
BSHS is international in its research outlook and membership, and we hope to welcome you soon. Click on bshs.org.uk to find out more and sign up!
