The aim of this paper is to discuss two historiographical issues pertaining to the history of science in the European periphery. The first issue concerns the wide use of the centre-periphery dichotomy in historical accounts discussing the diffusion and institutionalization of science across the world. The second issue concerns the use of appropriation (instead of transfer, or adaptation) as a means to overcome the diffusionist model in history of science. Recent work at the intersection of history of science with post-colonial studies will provide the framework for reassessing these matters. As it will be shown, theoretical discussions about the history of science in post-colonial context can help historians overcome the centre-periphery dichotomy and turn European periphery into a privileged standpoint for showing the actual diversity of 'European science.' At the same time, the experience of post-colonial studies can also help sharpen the historiographical tool of appropriation. The assumption that will be made is that by focusing on appropriation rather than on discovery and innovation (the favourite categories of much of mainstream historiography), or on transfer and adaptation (the favourite categories of the diffusionist model), historians of science can not only set aside the artificial distinctions of the diffusionist model, but also bring forward the re-inventions, the conceptual shifts and the cultural adjustments, which are responsible for the emergence of science as a global phenomenon in the periphery. Especially concerning European periphery, the use of appropriation may bring forward the particular historical circumstances under which certain knowledge patterns gained universal epistemic authority as constitutive elements of an imagined European intellectual identity.
In recent historiography of science, circulation has been widely used to weave global narratives about the history of science. These have tended to focus on flows of people, objects and practices rather than investigating the spread of universal patterns of knowledge. The approach has also, to a great extent, concentrated on colonial contexts and treated ‘European science’ as a more or less homogeneous knowledge realm. Furthermore, these studies of circulation have usually been tied to a contextualist view of knowledge formation in which locality is taken as a set of specificities linked with particular locations. In this article we redirect the focus of the discussion on circulation to Europe, and reference spaces that are often absent from other scholarly accounts. We will ground our discussion on a comparative study of three travelling actors from the European periphery through whom we will introduce the notion of ‘moving locality’ in order to depict circulation as a knowledge production process per se.
In the last three decades many historians of science have sought to account for the emergence of modern science and technology in sites that did not participate in the shaping of apparently original ideas. They have extensively used a model of the transfer of scientific ideas and practices from centres of scientific activity to a passively receptive periphery. This paper contributes to the discussion of an alternative historiographic approach, one that employs the notion of appropriation to direct attention towards the receptive modes and devices of a local culture. A historiography built around the notion of appropriation deals less with the question of the faithful transfer of scientific ideas than with the particular features of the discourse produced by local scholars as the best way to overcome or conform to the constraints of the receptive culture. The case examined to describe this culturally and intellectually intricate process is the profound transformation undergone by the Newtonian concept of vis inertiae in the work of Eugenios Voulgaris (1716–1806), one of the most important Greek scholars of the eighteenth century.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.