Get 20M+ Full-Text Papers For Less Than $1.50/day. Start a 14-Day Trial for You or Your Team.

Learn More →

Marking out a disciplinary common ground: The role of chemical pedagogy in establishing the doctrine of affinity at the heart of British chemistry

Marking out a disciplinary common ground: The role of chemical pedagogy in establishing the... Summary This paper presents a case study that contributes to the current debate among historians of chemistry concerning the role and influence of pedagogy in science. Recently, Bernadette Bensaude-Vincent and her colleagues concluded that in nineteenth-century France, ‘textbooks played an important role in discipline building and in creating theories’.1 Developing this idea further, this paper examines the dissemination of knowledge through face-to-face chemical lectures, showing that the influence of pedagogical strategy on theoretical content of the science is far from negligible. The pedagogy of William Cullen was essentially responsible for the prevalence of the doctrine of affinity in British chemistry from the 1760s onwards. Cullen used his affinity theory as a pedagogical tool that to a large extent defined his discipline, and the pedagogical pyramid that he headed similarly ensured that the doctrine would remain at the heart of British chemistry. From a pedagogical tool, the doctrine of affinity was transformed over time into a chemical tool, offering British chemists a disciplinary common ground that both set and reinforced the boundaries to their discipline. 1A. Garcia-Belmar, B. Bensaude-Vincent and J.R. Bertomeu-Sánchez, ‘The Power of Didactic Writings: French Chemistry Textbooks of the Nineteenth Century’, in Pedagogy and the Practice of Science: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives, edited by D. Kaiser (Cambridge, MA, 2005), 243. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Annals of Science Taylor & Francis

Marking out a disciplinary common ground: The role of chemical pedagogy in establishing the doctrine of affinity at the heart of British chemistry

Taylor, Georgette
Annals of Science , Volume 65 (4): 22 – Oct 1, 2008
Download PDF
22 pages

Loading next page...
 
/lp/taylor-francis/marking-out-a-disciplinary-common-ground-the-role-of-chemical-pedagogy-Zzp30fN9Y2

References (13)

Publisher
Taylor & Francis
Copyright
Copyright Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN
1464-505X
eISSN
0003-3790
DOI
10.1080/00033790701754290
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

Summary This paper presents a case study that contributes to the current debate among historians of chemistry concerning the role and influence of pedagogy in science. Recently, Bernadette Bensaude-Vincent and her colleagues concluded that in nineteenth-century France, ‘textbooks played an important role in discipline building and in creating theories’.1 Developing this idea further, this paper examines the dissemination of knowledge through face-to-face chemical lectures, showing that the influence of pedagogical strategy on theoretical content of the science is far from negligible. The pedagogy of William Cullen was essentially responsible for the prevalence of the doctrine of affinity in British chemistry from the 1760s onwards. Cullen used his affinity theory as a pedagogical tool that to a large extent defined his discipline, and the pedagogical pyramid that he headed similarly ensured that the doctrine would remain at the heart of British chemistry. From a pedagogical tool, the doctrine of affinity was transformed over time into a chemical tool, offering British chemists a disciplinary common ground that both set and reinforced the boundaries to their discipline. 1A. Garcia-Belmar, B. Bensaude-Vincent and J.R. Bertomeu-Sánchez, ‘The Power of Didactic Writings: French Chemistry Textbooks of the Nineteenth Century’, in Pedagogy and the Practice of Science: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives, edited by D. Kaiser (Cambridge, MA, 2005), 243.

Journal

Annals of Science – Taylor & Francis

Published: Oct 1, 2008

There are no references for this article.