2010 Prize Winners
Sarton Medal: Michael McVaugh
The Sarton Medal is the most prestigious award of the History of Science Society. It honors a lifetime of scholarly achievement and is awarded each year to a historian of science of outstanding merit selected from the international scholarly community. I am honored and delighted to have been asked by HSS President Paul Farber to summarize the scholarly achievement of this year’s Sarton medalist, Michael R. McVaugh, William Smith Wells Professor of History emeritus, University of North Carolina.
Michael McVaugh has devoted his exceptionally productive career to the history of medieval, and more recently also early modern, European medicine. His output of books, articles, and text editions, all marked by the most rigorous scholarship, is indeed extraordinary; and despite his recent retirement, it shows no signs of slowing down. His work commands the many and diverse forms of knowledge, practice, institutions, and social contexts that shaped medicine and its practitioners during those centuries. Equally impressive is his mastery of historical techniques and approaches. He is at home with both textual and archival sources. And he has made contributions of major importance to all of the following: the intellectual, the social and cultural, and the technological history of medieval medicine and natural philosophy.
Michael McVaugh received his B.A. from Harvard and his Ph.D. from Princeton University. He came to the Department of History of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as an assistant professor in 1964. This would remain his home department, with periods spent as a Directeur d’études invité at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris, and as a visiting fellow at Magdalen College, Oxford, and at Clare Hall, Cambridge, and many periods of research in Spain, until his retirement as William Smith Wells Professor in 2007.
Among Michael McVaugh’s very numerous articles are many valuable contributions to the history of learning in the university milieu, especially the medical faculty of the university of Montpellier. The focus of much of his work on the kingdom of Aragon and his collaborative projects with Spanish colleagues also places him among those scholars who have in recent years cast much new light on medieval Iberian history. In a long series of articles and in his book, Medicine Before the Plague (1993), he has presented the results of his archival research into the roles, interests, and regulation of medical practitioners in the kingdom of Aragon. For Medicine Before the Plague he was awarded the Welch Medal of the American Association of the History of Medicine, given for the best book in the field published in the previous five years.
Yet another area to which Michael McVaugh has made important contributions is the history of medieval surgery. His edition of and commentary on the massive Inventarium, or Chirurgia Magna –“great surgery”—of Guy de Chauliac (1997) made available a vast range of references, sources, and concepts relating to all forms of external treatment of the human body. His recent book, The Rational Surgery of the Middle Ages (2006), casts an entirely new light on the development and significance of surgery in the period. In it he explores the milieu and motives that led thirteenth- and early fourteenth-century surgeons to adopt reasoned knowledge and the language of Latin learning and to insist that surgery involved theory as well as practice.
Central to much of McVaugh’s work is his appreciation of the importance of textual scholarship and scholarly editing. As one of the originators and general editor of the series Opera medica omnia of Arnald of Villanova, published by the University of Barcelona, and as editor of several of the volumes within the series, he has provided invaluable new editions of works of a figure influential in medicine, natural philosophy, and religion, much of whose output was formerly available only in manuscript or in early printed editions. The scholarly introductions, by McVaugh and others, to the volumes in this series constitute a major body of interpretation of Arnald’s medical writings. As a collaborator in the project to publish the medical works of Maimonides in their Hebrew, Arabic, and Latin versions in critical editions based on the manuscripts, accompanied by new English translation, Michael McVaugh is now also contributing to improved access to texts significant for the transmission and reception of natural knowledge among the peoples of the medieval Mediterranean world.
Michael McVaugh’s influence has been widely felt among historians of medieval and early modern medicine and science; at the conference held at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill on the occasion of his retirement the more than twenty speakers represented a cross-section of international scholarship (I’m happy to report that the conference volume will appear this year). I am only one of many who has benefited from his scholarly generosity. I was a graduate student when I first encountered his work and came to appreciate his characteristic combination of intensive textual analysis with keen awareness of the social context of both learned and popular medical practice. My respect for his work has only deepened with the years. Michael McVaugh is a scholar of great distinction and a person of great modesty and integrity. I can think of no more suitable recipient of the Sarton medal.
Pfizer Prize: Maria Rosa Antognazza
The Pfizer Prize Committee has awarded the Pfizer Prize to Maria Rosa Antognazza for Leibniz: An Intellectual Biography published in 2009 by Cambridge University Press. Antognazza has focused on a familiar figure, known to all historians of science, philosophers, and to many others. Yet up to now this giant of the seventeenth century has been examined in a fragmentary way—some study his mathematics, some his physics, some his metaphysics, some his calculating machine, and some his interest in mining technologies. Leibniz’s Monadology is widely read, but is rarely understood in the context of his work as a whole. Almost all have viewed the vast amount of time that he spent in historical studies as an unfortunate digression that kept him from what they consider his far more important work in mathematics and physics. An integrated view of his thought has been lacking.
In response to this fragmentation and within the compass of an intellectual biography, Antognazza brilliantly explicates Leibniz’s life and thought as a coherent development. In this ambitious and synoptic biography, she shows the unity of his diverse interests and the importance of the central European context for his work. The depth of her analysis is impressive—whether discussing the infinitesimal calculus, physics, metaphysics, ethics, or theology, she successfully analyzes both the substance of his intellectual work and its relationships to the complex social, religious, and political world in which he moved.. She masterfully analyzes multifarious political machinations in the Hapsburg Empire and their consequences for Leibniz’s patronage, career, and thought. With equal mastery she elucidates the complex religious context of his time and the ways in which Leibniz’s irenicism—his persistent deeply felt attempts to harmonize diverse and often conflicting points of view—both influenced his metaphysics and represented his multifaceted response to a conflicted, often violent, and changing religious situation. Likewise Antognazza underscores the seriousness and importance of Leibniz’s historical work, and points out his rigorous archival approach to historical questions. Antognazza’s own meticulous attention to chronological detail and command of a massive and complex group of primary sources brings new clarity to Leibniz’s relationships with his scientific contemporaries, and to his priority dispute with Newton and the Newtonians. This masterful biography brings Leibniz to life and makes the depth and complexity of his thought as a whole comprehensible for the first time.
- Pamela O. Long, Chair
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John Servos
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Karen Reeds
Watson Davis and Helen Miles Davis Prize: Marcia Bartusiak
The Day We Found the Universe is a beautifully written, informative book on a critical topic in the history of science. Through skillful, rigorous, and creative use of archival and other sources, including oral histories, the author has made sense out of disparate, sometimes fragmentary data; crafted a rich, complex, yet crystal-clear narrative; and depicted a seminal moment in history. The discovery of the expanding universe—the notion of galaxies, galaxies, and more galaxies forming our cosmos—involved starts and stops, twists and turns, and a plethora of intriguing characters from Einstein, Shapley, and Hubble to relatively obscure figures such as Henrietta Leavitt, Vesto Slipher, Georges Lemaître, and Milton Humason. The narrative portrays the inner workings of science and of astrophysicists in the 1920s and 1930s through compelling vignettes and life histories. Our committee believes that this book will reach a broad audience, including undergraduates in several fields of study, and will appeal to scientists, historians, and the general reader alike. It is an exemplary choice for the Watson Davis and Helen Miles Davis Prize.
Marcia Bartusiak is an award-winning author and adjunct professor and executive director of the Graduate Science Writing Program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
- Kenneth R. Manning, Chair
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Edward J. Larson
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Maria M. Portuondo
Derek Price/Rod Webster Prize: Elizabeth A. Williams
Elizabeth A. Williams, “Neuroses of the Stomach: Eating, Gender, and Psychopathology in French Medicine, 1800–1870,” Isis, 2007, 98, 1: 54–79.
This article addresses the link drawn in French medicine between mental disturbance and aberrant patterns of eating from 1800 to the 1870s. Specifically, Williams describes the turn from “neuroses of the stomach,” that is, that psychic disorder was seated in the abdominal viscera, to “hysterical anorexia” and related disease entities. Williams shows how French cerebralists, as opposed to the “visceralists,” sought to explain disturbances of appetite, digestion, and eating using their knowledge of the central nervous system. Williams asks: “What was it, then, specifically in the 1870s that explains the appearance of a new disease associated with these patterns of bourgeois social life.” Her essay suggests that historical studies to date overemphasized socio-cultural determinants, thereby neglecting the internal dynamics within biomedical science itself. Williams shows that the emergence of anorexia was not seen as a new pattern of diseased behavior but rather emerged as a new clinical entity. Developments within medicine itself largely, but not exclusively, explain the appearance of “hysterical” or “mental” anorexia in the 1870s.
The Committee was especially impressed with how Williams' essay moved between the cultural, social, and internal aspects of her topic. The great strength of her work is her close and textured reading of the research field itself, which facilitated her broader historical interpretations. Williams successfully links the internal and external aspects of psychic illness, and she shows thereby how earlier accounts that overemphasized "socio-cultural determinants" have missed the internal dynamics of biomedical science. In fact， this essay is an important corrective to an over-reliance on context and culture. Through subtle rhetorical analysis and close readings of diagnostic documents, Williams uncovers a forgotten shift in medicine that she makes clear through the creative and useful categories she offers. Her essay is particularly notable for its sophisticated realignment of gender assumptions, showing that the gendering of eating issues is historically contingent.
- Benjamin Elman, Chair
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Sharrona Pearl
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Lloyd Ackert
Nathan Reingold Prize: Helen Anne Curry
As a historiographically sophisticated, clearly argued, well written, and interesting contribution to the history of science, Helen Anne Curry’s “Vernacular Experimental Gardens of the Twentieth Century,” fulfills each of the criteria outlined for the “ideal” Reingold Prize paper. In addition, her paper is an ambitious attempt to answer big questions and deals with a large swatch of time, ultimately demonstrating that the history of vernacular gardens adds an important component to the history of horticulture, plant science and genetics. Curry begins by asking “Where are gardens in the life sciences of the twentieth century?” With eloquent prose and an effective use of imagery, Curry then takes us on a fascinating journey through “vernacular gardens.” Along the way she highlights a persistent “tradition of amateur experimental inquiry and participation in the production of knowledge,” that has often influenced the trajectory and concerns of professional science. For example, Curry notes that vernacular gardeners accepted “chromosome engineering” in one decade, only to reject “genetic engineering” in another, a difference that Curry attributes to “amateurs’ ability to practice one technique but not the other in the own gardens.” In describing the history of vernacular gardens, Curry thus explains the origins of “authoritative amateurs willing to challenge professional science” now at the center of organized opposition to the techniques of modern agriculture. This is just one example of how Curry effectively makes the case that these gardens were “Not merely ‘intellectual weed patches,” and that they indeed merit attention in the history of science.
- Kristin Johnson, Chair
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Domenico Bertoloni Meli
- Richard Kremer
Joseph H. Hazen Education Prize: Michael R. Matthews
The 2010 Joseph Hazen Prize goes to Dr. Michael Matthews, Associate Professor of Education at the University of New South Wales, Australia. More than any other single individual, Michael Matthews deserves credit for instilling the History (and Philosophy) of Science in Science Education.
Dr. Matthews has written or edited ten books that address the history and philosophy of science and its role in science education. As one of his recommenders wrote, three are particularly relevant to this award. Science Teaching the Role of History and Philosophy of Science has served as a touchstone for research that teachers and scholars conduct in the history and philosophy of science as it relates to science education. Time for Science Education: How the History and Philosophy of Pendulum Motion can Contribute to Science Literacy formed the basis for the international Pendulum Project and associated publications. Finally, The Scientific Background to Modern Philosophy, an anthology of primary scientific documents has sold an enviable 36,000 copies and introduced numerous humanities studies to modern philosophy’s roots in science. His numerous journal articles and book chapters have addressed the history and philosophy of science, science education, and the philosophy of education.
As a visiting fellow in Philosophy at Florida State University in 1987, Matthews initiated the International History, Philosophy and Science Teaching Group, and he served as the group’s Founding President. He is also President of the Teaching Commission of the Division of History of Science and Technology of the International Union of History and Philosophy of Science. Matthews served as the Founding Editor for Science & Education: Contributions from the History and Philosophy of Science, a journal that will soon enter its twentieth year.
To quote from another of his many recommenders: “There has been no better friend or booster of the history of science, stressing that it has a vital role to play in educating young people, than Michael Matthews. And he has preached this gospel across the world, not just in America or in his homeland of Australia.”
- Fritz Davis, Chair
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Muriel Blaisdell
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Mark Borello
Suzanne J. Levinson Prize: Gregory Radick
It is with great pleasure that the committee awards the Suzanne J. Levinson Prize for the best book in the life sciences and natural history to Gregory Radick for The Simian T0ngue: The Long Debate about Animal Language (University of Chicago Press, 2007).
Radick’s book is a longue durée account of one of the most puzzling problems at the intersection of anthropology and the study of animal behavior. Where does our human language come from and do non-human primates possess language or are we separated by a language barrier? Radick has produced an interdisciplinary synthesis weaving together experimental designs and theoretical arguments as well as biographical and institutional perspectives. The result is a richly contextual multi-layered account presented as convincing narrative. Radick’s work touches many biological and anthropological disciplines and research fields. It thus opens up vast new lands for future historians to map and explore. As a history of an ongoing scientific debate it also engages historians of science and working scientists alike.
The Simian Tongue: The long debate about Animal Language is a worthy winner of the Suzanne J. Levinson Prize and we are certain that this creative work will move the disciplines of the history of biology and natural history forward and bring them closer to the current practice of science.
- Manfred Laubichler, Chair
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Garland Allen
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Sharon Kingsland
Margaret W. Rossiter History of Women in Science Prize: Marsha L. Richmond
The committee unanimously selects Marsha L. Richmond's "The 'Domestication' of Heredity: The Familial Organization of Geneticists at Cambridge University, 1895-1910" (Journal of the History of Biology, 2006, 39: 565-605) as winner of the 2010 Margaret W. Rossiter History of Women in Science Prize. Richmond argues persuasively not only that women made significant contributions to the development of genetics, but also that the domestic setting was essential to overcoming the marginalized position of early British geneticists. Specifically, she shows how field work in private, non-university settings made family involvement not only possible but crucial while simultaneously creating “domestic” social relations among researchers. Yet, as the field matured, the working conditions that had opened the door to women’s participation gave way to a more restricted environment. By incorporating gender relations in the lab, field, and household, this richly-documented and subtly-argued paper has enhanced our understanding of the complex but often hidden roles of women in scientific research.
- Zuoyue Wang, Chair
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Joan Cadden
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Elizabeth Williams