Download or read book The Ambonese Curiosity Cabinet written by Georg Eberhard Rumpf and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 1999 with total page 692 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: G. E. Rumphius, also known as the "Indian Pliny," was one of the great tropical naturalists of the seventeenth century. Born in Germany, he spent most of his life in the employ of the Dutch East India Company, stationed on the island of Ambon in eastern Indonesia. He wrote two major works; this one, the first modern work on tropical fauna, was published posthumously in Dutch in 1705. A classic text of natural history, it is now available in English for the first time. The descriptions in The Ambonese Curiosity Cabinet cover the gamut of organisms found in the seas surrounding Ambon--crabs, shrimp, sea urchins, mussels--as well as minerals and rare concretions taken from animals and plants. A series of exquisite etchings accompanies the descriptions. The book has been masterfully translated and extensively annotated by E. M. Beekman, whose introduction provides the first biography of Rumphius in English that incorporates new material.
Download or read book Conchophilia written by Marisa Anne Bass and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2023-05-16 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A history of shells in early modern Europe, and their rich cultural and artistic significance"--
Download or read book Wild Profusion written by Celia Lowe and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2006-10-03 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Wild Profusion' tracks the convergence of Indonesian biologists, Sama people, and flora and fauna in the Togean Islands od Sulawesi to tell the story of biodiversity conservation in 1990s Indonesia.
Download or read book The Dutch Trading Companies As Knowledge Networks written by Siegfried Huigen and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2010 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For more than a century, from about 1600 until the early eighteenth century, the Dutch dominated world trade. Via the Netherlands the far reaches of the world, both in the Atlantic and in the East, were connected. Dutch ships carried goods, but they also opened up opportunities for the exchange of knowledge. The commercial networks of the Dutch trading companies provided an infrastructure which was accessible to people with a scholarly interest in the exotic world. The present collection of essays brings together a number of studies about knowledge construction that depended on the Dutch trading networks. Contributors include: Paul Arblaster, Hans den Besten, Frans Blom, Britt Dams, Adrien Delmas, Alette Fleischer, Antje Flüchter, Michiel van Groesen, Henk de Groot, Julie Berger Hochstrasser, Grégoire Holtz, Siegfried Huigen, Elspeth Jajdelska, Maria-Theresia Leuker, Edwin van Meerkerk, Bruno Naarden, and Christina Skott.
Download or read book The art of science written by John Kean and published by Museum Victoria. This book was released on 2013-06-03 with total page 104 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Art of Science presents the best of Museum Victoria’s remarkable collection of natural history artworks, currently on a national touring exhibition of the same name. Based on the museum’s collection of rare books, field sketches, art works and taxonomic studies, the book features some of the most exquisite, rare and important illustrations of flora and fauna ever created. In addition to the artworks, which tell a story of exploration, discovery, painstaking research and documentation, the book also traces the lives, curiosities and observations of the artists and explorers, whom throughout history often worked against the odds to gather and record. The Art of Science is a unique collection of exquisite images that will enrich our understanding of the history of art and science, the natural world, and the miracle of human perception.
Download or read book An Explorer s Notebook written by Tim Flannery and published by Open Road + Grove/Atlantic. This book was released on 2014-02-04 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An invaluable collection of think pieces from a climate change expert and the author of the #1 international bestseller The Weather Makers. Tim Flannery is one of the world’s most influential scientists, a foremost expert on climate change credited with discovering more species than Charles Darwin. But Flannery didn’t come to his knowledge overnight. With its selection of exhilarating essays and articles written over the past twenty-five years, An Explorer’s Notebook charts the evolution of a young scientist doing fieldwork in remote locations to the major thinker who has changed the way we think about global warming. In over thirty pieces, Flannery writes about his journeys in the jungles of New Guinea and Indonesia, about the extraordinary people he met and the species he discovered. He writes about matters as wide-ranging as love, insects, population, water, and the stresses we put on the environment. He shows us how we can better predict our future by understanding the profound history of life on Earth. And he chronicles the seismic shift in the world’s attitude toward climate change. An Explorer’s Notebook is classic Flannery—wide-ranging, eye-opening science, conveyed with richly detailed storytelling. “Tim Flannery is in the league of all-time great explorers like Dr. David Livingstone.” —Sir David Attenborough
Download or read book Intercultural Exchange in Southeast Asia written by Tara Alberts and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2013-09-25 with total page 302 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At the dawn of European colonialism, the Southeast Asian region encompassed some of the most diverse and influential cultures in early modern history. The circulation of people, commodities, ideas and beliefs along the key trading routes, from the eastern edge of the Mughal empire to the southern Chinese border, stimulated some of the great cultural and political achievements of the age. This volume highlights the multifarious dimensions of exchange in eight fascinating case studies written by leading experts from the fields of History, Anthropology, Musicology and Art History. Intercultural Exchange in Southeast Asia explores religious change at both ends of the social spectrum, examining the factors which led to or impeded the conversion of kings to new faiths, as well as those which affected the conversion of the marginal communities of mercenaries and renegades. The artistic and cultural refashioning of new religions such as Christianity to suit local needs and sensibilities is highlighted in the Philippines, Siam, Vietnam and the Malay world while detailed analyses of scientific exchanges in maritime southeast Asia highlight the role of local agents, especially women, in the transmission of knowledge and beliefs. The articulation and cultural expression of power relations is addressed in chapters on colonial urban design and the use of music in diplomatic exchanges. This book utilises rare and unpublished sources to shed new light on the processes, strategies, and consequences of exchanges between cultures, societies and individuals and will be essential reading for those interested in the cultural and political origins of modern Asia.
Download or read book The Sound of the Sea Seashells and the Fate of the Oceans written by Cynthia Barnett and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2021-07-06 with total page 414 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Science Friday Best Science Book of the Year A Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Book of the Year A Library Journal Best Science and Technology Book of the Year A Tampa Bay Times Best Book of the Year A stunning history of seashells and the animals that make them that "will have you marveling at nature…Barnett’s account remarkably spirals out, appropriately, to become a much larger story about the sea, about global history and about environmental crises and preservation" (John Williams, New York Times Book Review). Seashells have been the most coveted and collected of nature’s creations since the dawn of humanity. They were money before coins, jewelry before gems, art before canvas. In The Sound of the Sea, acclaimed environmental author Cynthia Barnett blends cultural history and science to trace our long love affair with seashells and the hidden lives of the mollusks that make them. Spiraling out from the great cities of shell that once rose in North America to the warming waters of the Maldives and the slave castles of Ghana, Barnett has created an unforgettable history of our world through an examination of the unassuming seashell. She begins with their childhood wonder, unwinds surprising histories like the origin of Shell Oil as a family business importing exotic shells, and charts what shells and the soft animals that build them are telling scientists about our warming, acidifying seas. From the eerie calls of early shell trumpets to the evolutionary miracle of spines and spires and the modern science of carbon capture inspired by shell, Barnett circles to her central point of listening to nature’s wisdom—and acting on what seashells have to say about taking care of each other and our world.
Download or read book Skilled Visions written by Cristina Grasseni and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2007-01-01 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most arguments for a rediscovery of the body and the senses hinge on a critique of “visualism” in our globalized, technified society. This approach has led to a lack of actual research on the processes of visual “enskillment.” Providing a comprehensive spectrum of case studies in relevant contexts, this volume raises the issue of the rehabilitation of vision and contextualizes vision in the contemporary debate on the construction of local knowledge vs. the hegemony of the socio-technical network. By maintaining an ethnographic approach, the book provides practical examples that are both accessible to undergraduate students and informative for an academic audience.
Download or read book Made to Be Seen written by Marcus Banks and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2012-08-01 with total page 426 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Made to be Seen brings together leading scholars of visual anthropology to examine the historical development of this multifaceted and growing field. Expanding the definition of visual anthropology beyond more limited notions, the contributors to Made to be Seen reflect on the role of the visual in all areas of life. Different essays critically examine a range of topics: art, dress and body adornment, photography, the built environment, digital forms of visual anthropology, indigenous media, the body as a cultural phenomenon, the relationship between experimental and ethnographic film, and more. The first attempt to present a comprehensive overview of the many aspects of an anthropological approach to the study of visual and pictorial culture, Made to be Seen will be the standard reference on the subject for years to come. Students and scholars in anthropology, sociology, visual studies, and cultural studies will greatly benefit from this pioneering look at the way the visual is inextricably threaded through most, if not all, areas of human activity.
Download or read book Fragrant written by Mandy Aftel and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2014-10-16 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the 2016 Perfumed Plume Award The “Alice Waters of American natural perfume” (indieperfume.com) and author of the Art of Flavor celebrates our most potent sense, through five rock stars of the fragrant world Mandy Aftel is widely acclaimed as a trailblazer in natural perfumery. Over two decades of sourcing the finest aromatic ingredients from all over the world and creating artisanal fragrances, she has been an evangelist for the transformative power of scent. In Fragrant, through five major players in the epic of aroma, she explores the profound connection between our sense of smell and the appetites that move us, give us pleasure, make us fully alive. Cinnamon, queen of the Spice Route, touches our hunger for the unknown, the exotic, the luxurious. Mint, homegrown the world over, speaks to our affinity for the familiar, the native, the authentic. Frankincense, an ancient incense ingredient, taps into our longing for transcendence, while ambergris embodies our unquenchable curiosity. And exquisite jasmine exemplifies our yearning for beauty, both evanescent and enduring. In addition to providing a riveting initiation into the history, natural history, and philosophy of scent, Fragrant imparts the essentials of scent literacy and includes recipes for easy-to-make fragrances and edible, drinkable, and useful concoctions that reveal the imaginative possibilities of creating with—and reveling in—aroma. Vintage line drawings make for a volume that will be a treasured gift as well as a great read.
Download or read book Matters of Exchange written by Harold John Cook and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2007-01-01 with total page 576 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this provocative book, Richard Sennett looks at the ways today's global, ever-mutable form of capitalism is affecting our lives. He analyzes how changes in work ethic, in our attitudes toward merit and talent, and in public and private institutions have all contributed to what he terms 'the spectre of uselessness', and he concludes with suggestions to counter this disturbing new culture.
Download or read book Treasure Ships written by James Bennett and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A highlight for the Art Gallery of South Australia in June will be the much anticipated Treasure Ships: Art in the Age of Spiceswhich is the first exhibition in Australia to present the complex artistic and cultural interactions between Europe and Asia from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries - a period known as the Age of Spices.
Download or read book Early Modern Zoology written by Karel A. E. Enenkel and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2007 with total page 718 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this volume, specialists from various disciplines (Neo-Latin, French, German, Dutch, History, History of Science, Art History) explore the fascinating early modern discourses on animals in science, literature and the visual arts.
Download or read book Hearsay Is Not Excluded written by Michael R. Dove and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2024-02-27 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This chronicle of natural history argues that the modern environmental crisis and rise in science skepticism codeveloped with the rise of ever narrower scientific disciplines For millennia, the field of natural history promoted a knowledgeable and unifying view of the world. In contrast, the modern rise of narrow scientific disciplines has promoted a dichotomy between nature and culture on the one hand and between scientific and folk knowledge on the other. Drawing on the fields of anthropology, history, and environmental science, Michael R. Dove argues that the loss of this historic holistic vision of the world is partly to blame for contemporary environmental degradation and science skepticism. Dove bases this thesis on a study of four pioneering natural historians across four centuries: Georg Eberhard Rumphius (seventeenth century), Carl Linnaeus (eighteenth century), Alfred Russel Wallace (nineteenth century), and Harold C. Conklin (twentieth century). Dove studies their field craft and writing; the political, cultural, and environmental circumstances in which they worked; the sources of their insight; and the implications of their work for modern society. Most of all, the book seeks to discover what enabled those natural historians to straddle boundaries that today seem impassable and to distill that wisdom for a modern world greatly in need of a holistic vision of people and environment.
Download or read book 1688 A Global History written by John E. Wills Jr. and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2002-01-17 with total page 358 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A totally absorbing book...imaginative and erudite, full of startling juxtapositions and flashes of real perception."—Jonathan D. Spence John E. Wills's masterful history ushers us into the worlds of 1688, from the suicidal exaltation of Russian Old Believers to the ravishing voice of the haiku poet Basho. Witness the splendor of the Chinese imperial court as the Kangxi emperor publicly mourns the death of his grandmother and shrewdly consolidates his power. Join the great caravans of Muslims on their annual pilgrimage from Damascus and Cairo to Mecca. Walk the pungent streets of Amsterdam and enter the Rasp House, where vagrants, beggars, and petty criminals labored to produce powdered brazilwood for the dyeworks. Through these stories and many others, Wills paints a detailed picture of how the global connections of power, money, and belief were beginning to lend the world its modern form. "A vivid picture of life in 1688...filled with terrifying violence, frightening diseases...comfortingly familiar human kindnesses...and the intellectual achievements of Leibniz, Locke, and Newton."—Publishers Weekly
Download or read book Shaping a Dutch East Indies written by Siegfried Huigen and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2023-04-24 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1724-1726, the Dutch clergyman François Valentyn published a 5,000-page account of the Dutch East India Company’s empire. It was the first and, for a long time, the only survey of the Dutch establishments in Asia and South Africa. Shaping a Dutch East Indies analyses how Valentyn composed this work and how it largely determined the Dutch perspective on the colonies in Asia until the 1850s. It seeks to highlight both the great diversity of knowledge gathered in Valentyn’s book and its geographical spread, from the Cape of Good Hope to Japan, with a focus on the Indonesian archipelago. Huigen’s book is the first in-depth study of Valentyn’s work, which is a foundational text in the history of Dutch colonialism.
