The poor sister: Coming to grips with recent and contemporary chemistry

Weininger, Stephen J.

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/128617 Copy

Description

Title

The poor sister: Coming to grips with recent and contemporary chemistry

Author(s)

Weininger, Stephen J.

Issue Date

2022-01-01

Keyword(s)

• Chemistry
• History
• Recent History

Abstract

In 2007 a reviewer wrote that "The history of 20th-century chemistry has been the poor sister of physics and biology." Regrettably, that judgment is still valid. This paper argues for the necessity of elevating the profile of recent and contemporary chemistry (defined as chemistry of the last 60 and 30 years, respectively) in the historical literature and proposes a mechanism for doing so. It requires confronting a variety of challenges: the various audiences for history of chemistry that differ in technical and historical sophistication; the diversity of authors, among them chemists, chemist-historians and historians of science studying history of chemistry; and the necessity for adopting new research techniques and relinquishing some traditional ones. By far, most history of recent chemistry is written by chemists and chemist-historians and is only accessible to those with sophisticated technical training. However, that is not the only constraint preventing it from reaching a wider circle of readers. This body of literature lacks the essential contextual sophistication necessary for its inclusion in history of science publications. To overcome these barriers, HIST and the Science History Institute will collaborate on a workshop at the SHI connecting chemist-historians and historians of science in order to establish a shared background, to negotiate about the topic, structure, research agenda, and scope of proposed projects, and to plan for publication, when appropriate.

Publisher

Division of the History of Chemistry

ISSN

1053-4385

Type of Resource

text

Genre of Resource

article

Language

eng

Permalink

https://hdl.handle.net/2142/128617

DOI

https://doi.org/10.70359/bhc2022v047p119

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2022 Division of the History of Chemistry

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