2000 HSS/PSA Program 1 - History of Science Society

HSS Abstracts
return of German intellectuals and scientists to the British Isles commenced. One
institution, the Royal College of Surgeons of England, home of the great Hunterian
anatomical Museum and a prestigious lecture series in Comparative Anatomy,
played a central role in the formal transmission of German life science into London
in the 1815-1840 period. Its renowned anatomical museum drew a wave of foreign
visitors, including leading German scientific figures, to London after the Napoleonic
era who made personal contacts with individuals associated with the College.
Particularly through the lectures of Coleridge’s disciple, Joseph Henry Green, the
Hunterian Lecturer in Comparative Anatomy from 1824-29, the College also
became a primary vehicle by which the theories and content of German life science
and philosophy were transmitted to a London audience. This presentation will
focus on two main issues: 1) the renewal of German-English scientific contacts
after 1814 2) the role of the College of Surgeons in the dissemination of German
philosophy and biology into London in the 1815-40 period.
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E.␣ Elena Songster University of California, San Diego
Forest Stands for Pandas:
Scientific Forestry and Nature Reserves in Sichuan, China
“Forest Stands for Pandas: Scientific Forestry and Nature Reserves in Sichuan,
China” examines the creation of nature reserves in Southwestern province of
Sichuan in the People’s Republic of China. Most of Sichuan’s nature reserves
constitute (what I call) the “panda belt” of Sichuan. These panda-protecting nature
reserves exist in a band of counties that runs through the mountains on the Western
rim of the Sichuan basin from the center of the province to its northern edge. Most
of the reserves were created following the ideological and political shifts that
occurred in Chinese Communist Party as it attempted to better integrate China in
the international arena in the aftermath of the Cultural Revolution. For the first
time, the 1976 constitution explicitly incorporated environmental protection as a
governmental goal and duty. These reserves offered the Chinese government a
means of engaging with the international community through the medium of
science. In part due to the attention that such unique species as the panda and the
golden monkey attracted from both local and international scientific communities,
these hinterland areas were transformed into state-protected scientific research
reserves. In Sichuan these reserves thus became an important part of the province’s
rising image as a modern science center for China. The specialized designation of
“nature reserves” attempted to alter the way that the Sichuanese used and perceived
the nature and environment of their native province. Government regulation
commanded the Sichuanese to become stewards of the disappearing identity
through these natural (and now national) treasures that reached back to prehuman
existence by employing and supporting cutting-edge scientific advancement.
Sichuan’s nature reserves thus created perfect reflections of modern national(istic)
space through this obscured sense of time. Through the nature reserves, science