The History of Science Society

Vol. 39, No.3, July 2010
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Siraisi Delivers Haskins Lecture

Delegates and officers of the nominating societies. Front Row: Margaret Humphreys, American Association for the History of Medicine; Nancy Siraisi; Peggy Brown, Medieval Academy of America; Michael Sokal, HSS; Nancy Partner, Medieval Academy of America. Back Row: Michael Allen, Renaissance Society of America; John Monfasani, Renaissance Society of America, Jay Malone, HSS. Photo courtesy of Marc Barag.

Most HSS members probably know the American Council of Learned Societies best as the source of high prestige fellowships in the humanities for which they compete, often with great success. (See the list of recent fellows in this Newsletter.) The ACLS, however, does much more than fund research. Since its founding in 1919, it notably provides a forum at which leaders of its 70 constituent societies discuss issues of significance for all scholars in the humanities; for example, the 2010 ACLS annual meeting featured a major session on the Google Book Settlement and its implications for scholarship, and on how learned societies and their members could take best advantage of it.

Since 1983, however, the highlight of all annual meetings has been the Charles Homer Haskins Prize Lecture, presented by an especially distinguished scholar nominated by one of the constituent societies, who is asked to address “A Life of Learning.” For 2010, ACLS’s 28th Haskins Prize Lecturer was HSS member and Sarton Medal Laureate Nancy Siraisi, Distinguished Professor Emerita of History at Hunter College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.

Historians of science know Professor Siraisi well. They’ve studied and learned from her many books, including Avicenna in Renaissance Italy: The Canon and Medical Training in Italian Universities after 1500 (1987) and The Clock and the Mirror: Girolamo Cardano and Renaissance Medicine (1997). They’ve read “A Visit with Nancy Siraisi,” the insightful interview conducted by Michal Meyer that appeared in the HSS Newsletter in January 2004. And they’ve heard her gracious and thoughtful acceptance speeches on her receipt (in 1991) of the Watson Davis and Helen Miles Davis Prize for Medieval and Early Modern Medicine: An Introduction to Knowledge and Practice (1990), and (in 2003) of the Sarton Medal.

Her Haskins Lecture appraisal of her “Life of Learning” was equally gracious. After reviewing her early education in England, she recounted the direct and indirect impact, over the years, of her teachers and collaborators. She first noted Pearl Kibre, long-time Professor of History at Hunter College, who served as her mentor, and whose encouragement first inspired her to seek a scholarly career. Indeed, in 1970 she succeeded Professor Kibre at Hunter College. Others whom she mentioned included Lynn Thorndike (author of the 8 volumes of History of Magic and Experimental Science, 1923–1958), Paul Oskar Kristleller (himself a Haskins Prize Lecturer in 1990), and Michael R. McVaugh, her co-editor of Osiris 6 (1990), Renaissance Medical Learning: Evolution of a Tradition. In characterizing her scholarship as a matter of good luck rather than good management, she noted the continuous support of her husband, the artist Nobu Siraisi, and of her sons. She also traced the evolution of her scholarly interests over the years and highlighted her fascination with Girolamo Cardano—whom she described as a great teller of stories—who led her from the Middle Ages into the Renaissance.

Throughout her lecture Professor Siraisi reiterated a point she had emphasized when she accepted the Society’s Sarton Medal: that is, the importance of public support for higher education and, especially, for public universities. She thus emphasized the studentship that allowed her to study at St. Hilda’s College, Oxford (B.A., 1953) and then, after her migration to the United States, the financial assistance from Hunter College that supported her Ph.D. studies at the City University of New York. Indeed, she noted, if one were needed, this was the moral of her talk.

In first nominating Professor Siraisi for the Haskins Prize Lectureship, the History of Science Society was joined by three other ACLS constituents: the American Association for the History of Medicine (which awarded her its William Henry Welch Medal in 1985 for Taddeo Alderotti and His Pupils: Two Generations of Italian Medical Learning; 1981), the Renaissance Society of America (which she served as President, 1994–1996), and the Medieval Academy of America, of which she is an Emeritus Fellow. Indeed, in introducing Professor Siraisi’s Lecture, ACLS President Pauline Yu noted how unusual—perhaps unique—were such multi-society nominations. She also noted that, since Professor Siraisi had first been nominated, she has been honored with a MacArthur Fellowship.

Addressing less celebratory and more routine matters, the 2010 annual meeting also reviewed the roster of ACLS fellowship recipients. Over the years historians of science have competed successfully for just about all of these fellowships, and we all would do well to consider the range of support that ACLS provides for scholarship through these programs.

History of Science Society

Siraisi Delivers Haskins Lecture

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