Way back in the far-away-world of 2010 I was invited to attend the tenth of a series of symposia on Knowledge and Space sponsored by the Klaus Tschira Stiftung in the Studio Villa Bosch, Heidelberg.
It was one of the most stimulating academic events I’ve yet attended. Although I had by then already begun to read outside the discipline of History, I had been doing so in a somewhat haphazard and unguided manner. It was the 2010 symposium in Heidelberg that really opened up my eyes to the conversations about knowledge, space, mobility and technology taking place in Science Studies and Geography. At it I met several scholars whose work has deeply influenced my own and encountered new horizons for my research.
Now some of the papers from this event have been published as Mobilities of Knowledge (volume 10 in the Klaus Tschira Knowledge and Space Book Series). Together they examine how the geographical mobility of people and (im)material things has impacted epistemic systems of knowledge in different historical and geographical contexts. Thanks to Springer and the Klaus Tschira Stiftung the volume is available online and as open access. (Other volumes from the series are available here)
My piece considers the changing appointment practices of universities in late nineteenth and early twentieth century Britain and its empire. It points to the importance of private knowledge and highlights the cultures of trust that shaped an academic geography that was both expansive and exclusionary.
But it should be the last thing you read. Check out this fantastic list of contributors!
Mobilities of Knowledge
Mobilities of Knowledge: An Introduction
Heike Jöns, Michael Heffernan, Peter Meusburger
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Circulation, Transfer, and Adaptation
Spatial Mobility of Knowledge: Communicating Different Categories of Knowledge
Peter Meusburger
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Papermaking: The Historical Diffusion of an Ancient Technique
Jonathan M. Bloom
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Circulating Seditious Knowledge: The “Daring Absurdities, Studied Misrepresentations, and Abominable Falsehoods” of William Macintosh
Innes M. Keighren
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Exploration as Knowledge Transfer: Exhibiting Hidden Histories
Felix Driver
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The Imprecise Wanderings of a Precise Idea: The Travels of Spatial Analysis
Trevor Barnes, Carl Christian Abrahamsson
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Knowledges in Disciplines and Cities: An Essay on Relations Between Archaeology and Social Sciences
Peter J. Taylor
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Mediators, Networks, and Learning
Collaboration and Knowledge Exchange between Scholars in Britain and the Empire, 1830–1914
Heather Ellis
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Geographies of Selection: Academic Appointments in the British Academic World, 1850–1939
Tamson Pietsch
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The University of Cambridge, Academic Expertise, and the British Empire, 1885–1962
Heike Jöns
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Geneva, 1919–1945: The Spatialities of Public Internationalism and Global Networks
Madeleine Herren
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The Spatial Mobility of Corporate Knowledge: Expatriation, Global Talent, and the World City
Jonathan V. Beaverstock
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Formal Education as a Facilitator of Migration and Integration: A Case Study of Nigerian University Graduates
Melanie Mbah
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Trans-knowledge? Geography, Mobility, and Knowledge in Transnational Education
Johanna L. Waters, Maggi Leung
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Cap and Gown 