A Very Trump of Doom: How the Simple Stethoscope Transformed Medial Diagnosis Dr Melissa Dickson's piece on the history of the stethoscope has been published on the Medium channel at The Oxford Research Centre in the Humanities. 22 Jul 2016
Along the Lines event and blog post ‘Along The Lines’ was an immersive, virtual workshop and performance that took place in September and October 2020. 1 Feb 2021
Be Still My Beating Heart One frequently made observation about the nineteenth century is that it was marked by a number of breakthroughs in medicine and the sciences which revealed forces that shape humanity. 6 Aug 2015
Captivating Respiration: the 'Breathing Napoleon' I’ve always felt uncomfortable around waxworks and dummies. 21 Oct 2015
Confusing Times: Communicating, 24/7 In the age of smartphones, broadband internet access, and cheap(ish) air travel, the vision of the ‘global village’, appears to have become a reality. 2 Mar 2018
Diseases in the News: The Heavy Burden of a Modern Age On 10th September 2016, the Diseases of Modern Life project was featured in the Dutch national newspaper Trouw. 29 Sep 2016
Dracula and Modern Life Dr Emilie Taylor-Brown, Dr Hosanna Krienke, and Dr Sarah Green recently led a post-performance panel discussion for Creation Theatre’s production of Dracula, which was staged at Blackwell’s Bookshop. 2 May 2018
Electric Stair-Climbers and Mobility in the Nineteenth Century In his book on machines and modernity in India, historian David Arnold rightly points out that ‘big technologies’ like the telegraph and the railways have received more attention from scholars than smaller, ‘everyday technologies’. 15 Apr 2016
File It Under C... There is a folder in my desk-drawer at the moment, one of several containing the fruits of months of research into various aspects of nineteenth-century science and disease. 3 Sep 2014
Podcast series: Diseases in Dialogue Researchers from the ERC-funded "Diseases of Modern Life" project at the University of Oxford join experts from a range of fields to discuss some of the major questions surrounding scientific, technological and medical developments. 3 Jun 2019
Requiem for a Cliché One of the hallmarks of the sci-fi horror genre is its tendency to generate instant clichés. 1 Dec 2015
Something in the Air: Dr Carter Moffat’s Ammoniaphone and the Victorian Science of Singing Dr Melissa Dickson's article, Something in the Air: Dr Carter Moffat's Ammoniaphone and the Victorian Science of Singing, has been published in the Spring 2017 edition of the Science Museum Group Journal. 28 Apr 2017
Stormy Weather and Human Barometers In 1873, a speaker at the Royal Dublin Society declared that ‘many persons are inclined to deny altogether the existence of a weather-science'. 14 Jun 2016
Telegraphs, Electromagnetic Polkas and the Vienna New Year’s Day Concert I remember being fascinated by the glittering chandeliers, the massive, colourful bouquets of flowers, the guests from all over the world sporting their traditional attires and, of course, the music. 9 Jan 2015
Telegraphy's Trials, Tribulations and Triumphs My research aims to uncover the lesser-known twists and turns in this narrative, to explore both the hopes and the frustrations, the anxieties as well as the excitement which were associated with telegraphy in nineteenth-century Europe. 20 Oct 2017
The Bane of Modern Technology The tragedy of comedy, for those who work at creating it, at least, is that jokes will go off. 5 Aug 2014
The Brain Child of Mariano Luigi Patrizi If the project of medical science may be described as the exploration of the human body, then surely its final, vastest, most mysterious frontier is the brain. 13 Dec 2014
The Living and the Dead captures Victorian anxieties about science and the supernatural From telegraphs to television sets, new technologies have often been imagined as strange or magical in the popular consciousness. 22 Jun 2016
The Nausea of Noise We are big on peace and quiet in Oxford. For eight hours a day, the most that is likely to disturb me from my research is the faint lowing of cattle in the fields behind the college, or the movement of papers around me in the Bodleian. 3 Jul 2014
The Victorians had the Same Concerns about Technology as We Do We live, we are so often told, in an information age. It is an era obsessed with space, time and speed. 21 Jun 2016
22 Aug Inside and Outside Bodies at the University of Glasgow Dr Melissa Dickson and Dr Jennifer Wallis will be speaking about two moments of Victorian social and cultural anxiety in a panel entitled ‘Inside and Outside Bodies: the Science of Micro and Macrocosms’ University of Glasgow
29 May Panel on Technology and Disease at the 41st Symposium of ICOHTEC Two of our project members, Dr. Amelia Bonea and Dr. Jennifer Wallis, will be presenting aspects of their research at the 41st Symposium of the International Committee for the History of Technology, to be held in Braşov, Romania. Braşov, Romania
19 Nov Project Launch Event at St Anne's College On November 6, Professor Sally Shuttleworth’s two research projects, ‘Diseases of Modern Life: Nineteenth-Century Perspectives’ and ‘Constructing Scientific Communities: Citizen Science in the 19th and 21st Centuries’ were launched at St Anne’s College.
21 Dec Science, Medicine and Culture in the Nineteenth Century: Seminars in Hilary Term 2016 Our programme for Hilary Term 2016 is now announced with two seminars taking place at St Anne’s College. St. Anne's College
13 Apr Science, Medicine and Culture in the Nineteenth Century: Seminars in Trinity Term 2016 Our programme for Trinity Term is now announced with three seminars taking place at St Anne's College.