Studies in History of Sciences
Contents: Preface. 1. Santimay Chatterjee/M.N. Saha, S.N. Bose and N.R. Sen. 2. Ramchandra--a pioneer among science popularisers in 19th century India/S. Irfan Habib. 3. Ray\'s life and experiences as a text on the history of science/Dhruv Raina. 4. George Sarton and the \'Two Cultures\'/Ashish Lahiri. 5. Ram Brahma Sanyal and the Asiatic society/D.K. Mittra. 6. Satish Chandra\'s journey from nationalisation to nationalism/Subhendu Dasgupta. 7. Science and philosophy on symmetry and spirituality/D.P. Chattopadhyaya. 8. Search for new planets/Jayant V. Narlikar. 9. Susruta-Samhita : from Devil worship to modern surgery/R.L. Brahmachary. 10. History of meteorology and monsoons in India/N. Sen Roy and K. Prasad.
11. Teaching the history of technology/Bruce E. Seely. 12. Guatemalan blues : a social history of Indigo technology in colonial central America/Judith Vidal. 13. The changing gender authority in American home appliance technology : dishwasher and washing machine patents from 1860 to 1950/Orville R. Butler. 14. Environment concern through the ages/Prasad Ray. 15. A Canal-Wallah in India/William E. Trout, III. 16. Image inscriptions as source material for history of technology : a case study/Jagatpati Sarkar. 17. Orientalism and technology : a case study of introduction of voice-recording in India/Amitabha Ghosh.
"The present volume is a mosaic of articles, a witness to the emergence of different schools of historiography who debate about bracketing science and technology together, about internal history (of viewing the scientific community as a society in itself) and external history (study of science in society at large) or even about whether sciences and not science in general merit their own history with regional variations. Some of the articles discuss personalities who have seen to the emergence of this country as a meaningful participant in the international sphere of scientific studies, relate science to other disciplines and also trace the rich heritage of endeavours in specific areas like medicine in the ancient period or voice recording technology in the early years of this century. Together with these, developments in technology in certain areas, beyond the frontiers of this nation have also been discussed. Nothing is too insignificant to be taken note of, not even dishwashers (gender issue in technology) or the canal system (industrial archaeology) in the broad canvas of history of sciences." (jacket)
