CfP: Cities, Science and Satire: Satirical Representations of Urban Modernity and Scientific and Technological Innovation in the Public Space
Session S25: Cities, Science and Satire: Satirical Representations of Urban Modernity and Scientific and Technological Innovation in the Public Space
13th Conference of the
European Association for Urban History, Helsinki, August 24-27, 2016
Deadline: October 31, 2015
Session Chairs: Markian Prokopovych (markian.prokopovych@univie.ac.at)
and Katalin Straner (stranerk@ceu.edu)
European urban spaces underwent
fundamental transformation due to unprecedented scientific and technological
modernisation as well as the emergence of the urban press from the eighteenth
century onwards. In the course of just a few decades, modern roads and
transportation connected previously distant cities as well as city districts to
each other and to the city centre; street lightning made evenings safer and
easier to navigate; and the provision of fresh water and canalisation prevented
the spread of previously devastating epidemics and changed approaches to urban
and personal hygiene. All these and other urban innovations were preceded by –
and sometimes went hand in hand with – the increasing presence of scientific
institutions in the urban landscape and the public sphere. Universities,
academies, learned societies, clubs, casinos and coffee houses turned into
places where the learned communities communicated with each other as well as
presented themselves and their seemingly unchallenged knowledge to the broader
public.
This rapid change was however not
free from glitches and repeated failures, which was often regarded as
inconvenience and nuisance to city dwellers: modern means
of transportation squeezed people together challenging concepts of
respectability and dignity, pipes broke, new urban projects caused visual and
sensual embarrassment and often went wrong, and new scientific theories about
urban betterment and “beautification” left the carriers of scientific authority
embarrassed as well. Even the scientific quarters themselves – the new university
campuses or the buildings of science and technology – often turned out
inadequate to their initial purpose. The denizens of early modern and modern
cities were not immune to these changes and liked to joke about them perhaps
even more than we do today. The urban public sphere — the urban folklore, jokes
that became stale from being transferred and readapted from generation to
generation and from place to place, the boulevard press and other forms of
sensational literature — were ideal venues to ventilate everyday grievances and
discomforts though a creative use of humour and satire, and this led to the
emergence and increasing popularity of the satirical press. This session will
capitalise on the emerging new body of literature on the “urban turn” in the
history of science and, at the same time, will zoom in even closer at specific
urban projects and technological innovations that generated urban satire,
revealing a much more complex and problematic representation of urban modernity.
Please submit your proposals online
via the EAUH2016 website https://eauh2016.net/.
Proposals sent by post or email will not be accepted. Abstracts of paper
proposals should not exceed 300 words. Deadline for paper proposals submission:
October 31, 2015. Notification of paper acceptance: December 15, 2015.
Dr. Katalin Straner
Visiting Lecturer, Department of
History
Associate Research Fellow, Pasts, Inc. Center for Historical Studies
Associate Research Fellow, Pasts, Inc. Center for Historical Studies
Central European University
Nador u. 9
H-1051 Budapest
stranerk@ceu.edu
Nador u. 9
H-1051 Budapest
stranerk@ceu.edu