ESEH 2019: Boundaries in/of Environmental History

Chair & Organizer: Anastasia Fedotova, Institute for the History of Science and Technology, Russian Academy of Science

Staffan Müller-Wille, University of Exeter
Dominik Hünniger, University of Hamburg
Ana Isabel Queiroz, IHC, NOVA-FCSH Lisboa
Kerstin Pannhorst, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science
Alejandro Martinez, Universidad Nacional de La Plata

Abstract:
The roundtable will be devoted to economically and medically significant insect species as research objects, and how research on these species crosses the boundaries drawn between human economy and the economy of nature. The topic is deliberately conceived as a very broad one that could potentially be of interest to an array of disciplinary fields beyond the history of science and technology, such as environmental or economic history or the anthropology of human-animal relations. In general, with very few exceptions such as bees or silkworm, insects only catch the attention of researchers when perceived as a threat to the prosperity and well-being of human. It makes sense that medically and economically significant insect species have enjoyed better chances to become privileged research objects; however, there are numerous examples also when some of these species remained under-researched for a long time. 
The historiography of insects has predominantly focused on the conceptual and technological means invested in their eradication. In our panel we want to discuss ways in which such a linear perspective on “applied entomology” can be overcome. The object of applied entomology, we contend, is constituted by dynamic multi-species interactions that undercut any clear-cut analysis in terms of costs and benefits and have fostered a perspective that, on the one hand, turns non-human animals into economic subjects while, on the other hand, aligning human economic activities with biological needs. The models entomologists have developed to understand the dynamics of human-insect interactions, and the enviro-technical interventions that have been based on these models, therefore have always entwined ecological and economical thought and action, contrasting with their divorce in neo-classical economics. Geographic location and environmental conditions, for example, exercise a powerful influence upon what counts as a biological threat posed by insects, and thus might affect the making of specific institutional, regional or national traditions and ‘schools’ within specific fields of study. Moreover, local agents (farmers, craftsmen, hunters, healers, etc.) could possess more nuanced experience in dealing with particular insect species than the entomologists. Growing awareness of the economic importance of such species by the state would thus have pressured metropolitan scholars into changing social and institutional arrangements to tap into these knowledge sources at the periphery, forcing them to leave their familiar environment, relocate to new, often challenging and potentially dangerous milieus, and transcend cultural and linguistic gathering knowledge to be reported back and systematized.