A Democracy of Facts
Natural History in the Early Republic
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 5705188 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Susan Scott Parrish (University of Michigan, corresponding author), Parrish |
| Year | 2012 |
| Volume | 99 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 293-294 |
| Publication date | 2012-06-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of American History (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0021-8723 • E-ISSN: 1945-2314 |
| Publisher | Oxford University Press (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1093/jahist/jas036 |
| OpenAlex | W2127607844 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 2 |
In A Democracy of Facts, Andrew J. Lewis tells the story of the emergence of a postrevolutionary epistemological posture within U.S. natural history, namely that “possibility should be the default position until proven incorrect. Results of contrived experiments and human reason did not unseat prevailing opinion and the authority of testimony” (p. 32). This resistance to what was seen as experimental fabrication or premature theoretical closure—traits associated with European science—implied the inclusion of more non-elites as eyewitnesses; it implied, in the University of Pennsylvania professor Benjamin Smith Barton’s words, “a democracy of facts.” The real strength of Lewis’s study is to show how, almost as soon as such a posture emerged in reaction especially to French theorizing about the Americas, it was found problematic by the very naturalists who were its source. As Lewis states, naturalists abandoned this democratic, market-oriented natural history almost as soon as many had issued calls for it to begin, falling back on tried and true methods ... that replicated the patterns and epistemology of the colonial era, one heavily reliant on gentlemanly protocols. (p. 49
Archaeology · Colonialism · Democracy · Natural (archaeology · Natural history · Political science · Politics · Resistance (ecology · Sociology · American Constitutional Law and Politics · American History and Culture · History · History of Science and Medicine · Law · Medicine
| Unique citing works | 2 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,17 |
| Citation span | 2014 - 2019 (6) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 2 |