CfP: Natures, Sciences, Cultures, Politics 500-1500 / St Andrews, March 2020

How should we understand pre-modern sciences and what they were for? That people did not have ‘modern’ epistemologies, methods, or concerns is often less instructive and interesting than what people did do, in what contexts, and to what ends. The purpose of this conference is to discuss how the natural world was seen, discussed, rationalised and conceptualised c. 500-c. 1500, paying attention to the diversity of worldviews within and between regions globally.

Papers (20mins) are invited that might explore:

• Competing epistemologies and methodologies
• The transmission and reception of ideas between cultures
• Processes and contexts of organising knowledge about natures
• Intersections of sciences (defined broadly), religions, politics, art
• The politics of misrepresenting pre-modern sciences

Email abstracts (200-300 words) or queries to James T Palmer at jtp21@st-andrews.ac.uk by 1 October 2019.