An exceptionally coherent collection of essays that contributes to the historiography of British science by tracing the emergence of modern scientific disciplines during the nineteenth century.-- "Environmental History"
From our twenty-first century vantage point, it may appear that the Victorians drew up and abided by the firm disciplinary boundaries that we work within today. But the close and nuanced reading in this volume reveals a messier, mobile, and more interesting nineteenth-century ecology of Western knowledge. Exploring both consensus and contest, Lightman and Sera-Shriar have assembled a cadre of leading and emerging scholars to unpack interdisciplinary ways of knowing via a range of scientists, sites, and media. At times surprising and otherwise challenging, Victorian Interdisciplinarity and the Sciences is always engaging.--Samuel Alberti, National Museums Scotland
This collection of essays provides a comprehensive, varied, and highly readable account of how the nascent disciplines of nineteenth-century science were regularly brought together into new intellectual configurations. As such, the volume provides a welcome corrective to the customary emphasis on the academic specialization that seemed to otherwise characterize the period.--Gowan Dawson, University of Leicester