The Circulation of Knowledge Between Britain, India and China : The Early-Modern World to the Twentieth Century PDF
Preview The Circulation of Knowledge Between Britain, India and China : The Early-Modern World to the Twentieth Century
The Circulation of Knowledge Between Britain, India and China History of Science and Medicine Library VOLUME 36 Knowledge Infrastructure and Knowledge Economy Edited by Karel Davids, VU University, Amsterdam Larry Stewart, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon VOLUME 3 The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/hsml The Circulation of Knowledge Between Britain, India and China The Early-Modern World to the Twentieth Century Edited by Bernard Lightman, Gordon McOuat and Larry Stewart LEIDEn • BOSTOn 2013 Cover illustration: The Planetarium in China. Watercolour by William Alexander (1792). Reproduced by permission of the British Library Board. WD 961/42 (122) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data The circulation of knowledge between Britain, India, and China : the early-modern world to the twentieth century / edited by Bernard Lightman, Gordon McOuat and Larry Stewart. pages cm. — (History of science and medicine library ; volume 36) (Knowledge infrastructure and knowledge economy ; volume 3) Includes index. ISBn 978-90-04-24441-2 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBn 978-90-04-25141-0 (e-book) 1. Discoveries in science—History. 2. Communication in science—Europe—History. 3. Science—Great Britain—History. 4. Science—India—History. 5. Science—China—History. 6. Knowledge, Sociology of. 7. Enlightenment. I. Lightman, Bernard V., 1950– editor of compilation. II. McOuat, Gordon, editor of compilation. III. Stewart, Larry, 1946–, author, editor of compilation. Q126.8.C56 2013 303.48’30903—dc23 2013007039 This publication has been typeset in the multilingual “Brill” typeface. With over 5,100 characters covering Latin, IPA, Greek, and Cyrillic, this typeface is especially suitable for use in the humanities. For more information, please see www.brill.com/brill-typeface. ISSn 1872-0684 ISBn 978-90-04-24441-2 (hardback) ISBn 978-90-04-25141-0 (e-book) Copyright 2013 by Koninklijke Brill nV, Leiden, The netherlands. Koninklijke Brill nV incorporates the imprints Brill, Global Oriental, Hotei Publishing, IDC Publishers and Martinus nijhoff Publishers. All rights reserved. no part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill nV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-free paper. COnTEnTS Preface: The Dalhousie University James Dinwiddie Collection ..... ix Karen Smith Acknowledgements ........................................................................................ xiii List of Contributors ........................................................................................ xv List of Illustrations .......................................................................................... xix Introduction ..................................................................................................... 1 Bernard Lightman, Gordon McOuat, and Larry Stewart PART OnE CIRCULATInG KnOWLEDGE: JAMES DInWIDDIE In CHInA, InDIA, AnD BRITAIn The Spectacle of Experiment: Instruments of Circulation, from Dumfries to Calcutta and Back ............................................................. 21 Larry Stewart “Bungallee House set on fire by Galvanism”: natural and Experimental Philosophy as Public Science in a Colonial Metropolis (1794–1806) ............................................................................ 45 Savithri Preetha Nair From Calcutta to London: James Dinwiddie’s Galvanic Circuits ..... 75 Jan Golinski PART TWO CIRCULATIOn BEYOnD DInWIDDIE Bringing Eastern Science to the West: Portuguese Voyages of Intellectual Discovery ............................................................................... 97 Arun Bala vi contents Anthologizing the Book of nature: The Origins of the Scientific Journal and Circulation of Knowledge in Late Georgian Britain ................................................................................................................. 119 Jonathan R. Topham Between Calcutta and Kew: The Divergent Circulation and Production of Hortus Bengalensis and Flora Indica ........................ 153 Khyati Nagar PART THREE THE CIRCULATIOn OF EVOLUTIOn, GEOLOGY, AnD AnTIQUITIES In CHInA Knowledge Across Borders: The Early Communication of Evolution in China .................................................................................... 181 Yang Haiyan Circulating Material Objects: The International Controversy Over Antiquities and Fossils in Twentieth-Century China ..................... 209 Fa-ti Fan Going with the Flow: Chinese Geology, International Scientific Meetings and Knowledge Circulation ................................................. 237 Grace Yen Shen PART FOUR BUILDInG SCIEnCE In MODERn InDIA How May We Study Science and the State in Postcolonial India? 263 Jahnavi Phalkey A Western Scientist in an Eastern Context: J. B. S. Haldane’s Involvement in Indian Science .............................................................. 285 Veena Rao contents vii PART FIVE COnCLUSIOn Translation as Method: Implications for History of Science ............. 311 Sundar Sarukkai Index ................................................................................................................... 331 PREFACE: THE DALHOUSIE UnIVERSITY JAMES DInWIDDIE COLLECTIOn Karen Smith How Eastern and Western scientists of an earlier era exchanged ideas and influenced each other’s work is difficult to document as primary source material has been vulnerable to the ravages of time. To help shed light on the intersection of Western and Eastern science in the late eighteenth century, Dalhousie University is pleased to make available the working papers of the noted scientist, Dr. James Dinwiddie (1746–1815), whose career took him from Scotland to India and China and London. The story of how the Dinwiddie papers arrived at Dalhousie University is a fascinating one that involves a large cast of interesting people. James Dinwiddie was from Dumfries in the Lowlands of Scotland. After Dinwiddie’s death in 1815 his papers, library and scientific instruments went to his only child, Ann.1 Ann had married James Proudfoot, a gun- maker in Dumfries, and they had six children. Two of the six were pri- marily responsible for preserving their grandfather’s papers—notably, the third son William and the youngest, Catherine. The two eldest brothers also played a minor role. normally the eldest son would inherit all worldly goods but the two older Proudfoot sons were very poor managers, and, according to their bother William, they were worthless alcoholics. They managed to lose the family farm and were forced to vacate the Proudfoot estate, Cottagehead.2 William, a surveyor in Liverpool, prevailed upon his brothers to allow him to take procession of the James Dinwiddie papers and library. William gathered up the trunk of Dinwiddie papers in October 1846 and added the books in 1848. In a journal entry for Oct. 11, 1846, William vowed to spend his leisure hours writing the memoirs 1 William Proudfoot, Biographical memoir of James Dinwiddie, LL.D. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010: reprint of 1868 edition published by E. Howell, Liverpool, England), 124. 2 Dalhousie University Archives (hereinafter DUA), Halifax, nova Scotia, Canada. James Dinwiddie fonds, MS-2-726, File I.2. Journal of William Proudfoot, Oct. 1840–1852, entry for April 3, 1848. x preface of Dr. Dinwiddie.3 Twenty years later he published, Biographical mem- oir of James Dinwiddie, LL.D., astronomer in the British Embassy to China, 1792,’3,4’: Afterwards professor of Natural Philosophy in the College of Fort William, Bengal: Embracing some account of his travels in China and resi- dence in India (Liverpool: Edward Howell, 1868). Fortunately this volume has been recently reprinted in the Cambridge Library Collection Travel and Exploration series and is readily available. After he retired, William relocated to Tunbridge Wells, Kent and lived with his sister, Catherine Bulman. Catherine’s son, James Dinwiddie Bulman, immigrated to Canada in the 1870s and ended up in Sweetsburg, Quebec,4 where he served as Captain and Adjutant in the 79th Battalion. James also worked as a registrar of patents and as a practical watchmaker and jeweller. not surprisingly he was good with tools and specialized in chronometer, rack level and watch repair.5 The trunk of James Dinwiddie papers was passed down to James Bulman and made the trip across the Atlantic Ocean. The Dinwiddie trunk remained in the Bulman family home in Sweetsburg until the 1970s. Ann Dinwiddie Bulman Ashness-Wells, James Bulman’s daughter, and her niece May Bulman shared the Bulman family home. Between 1970 and Ann’s death in 1974, many family furnishings and items were dispersed to interested family members and others sold. A few letters, two notebooks and two journals were given to a family mem- ber in Alberta and are now reintegrated back into the collection. A trunk with most of the Dinwiddie papers still intact was acquired by Dr. Gilles Bisson, a Montreal surgeon, who lived in nearby Cowansville, Quebec.6 He switched specialities and accepted a position as pathologist at the Victoria General Hospital in Halifax in 1972. The Dinwiddie trunk was packed up with all the Bisson furnishings and transported to Halifax. In the late 1990s, a Bisson grand-daughter took a history course at Dalhousie University and mentioned to her professor that her grand-mother was 3 DUA, MS 2-726. Journal of William Proudfoot, Oct. 1840–1852, entry for October 11, 1846. 4 DUA, MS 2-726, Journal of William Proudfoot, June 1875–Oct. 1879, entry for May 21, 1878. 5 “Sweetsburg, Quebec” in County of Missisquoi and Town of St. Johns Directory for 1879, 1880 and 1881 (Montreal: O. L. Fuller, 1879), 113; “Dominion of Canada Militia List” in Canadian Almanac and Repository of Useful Knowledge for the year 1893 (Toronto: Copp, Clark Co., 1892), 66. 6 “Gilles E. Bisson”, in Canadian Medical Directory (Don Mills, Ont.: Seccombe House, 1970).
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