Science, scientific instruments and questions of method in nineteenth‐century British geography

Abstract

The paper explores the promotion of method in nineteenth-century British geography. Attention is paid to the emphasis accorded scientific instruments in a period when scientific subjects were, in practice and in personnel, 'disciplining' themselves. The role ascribed to scientific instruments and method is examined with reference to the work in the Royal Geographical Society of Julian R. Jackson and his What to observe, or the traveller's remembrancer (1841), and William Hamilton's essay on geographical methods in John Herschel's Manual of scientific enquiry (1849). These works are further explored with reference to two related texts, the Society's Hints to travellers (Raper and Fitzroy 1854) and Francis Galton's The art of travel (1855). The paper for the first time brings together evidence for the place of scientific instruments within geography's methodological pronouncements with scholarship in the history of technology and the history of science. In doing so, the paper highlights the importance of critical histories of geography's methods, instruments and associated practices. The conclusion addresses the implications of such research for providing yet richer histories of geography that might address not just the subject's cognitive content and institutional context but matters of epistemological procedure, moral conduct and authorial regimen in relation to precision instrumentation.

Geography and “thing knowledge”: Instrument epistemology, failure, and narratives of 19th‐century exploration

“…In geography, the use of scientific instruments – chiefly hand‐held or manually operated devices for measurement – was important in the subject's empirical development in the 19th century, in association with instructional guides on how to observe and what to record (Driver, , ; Rae et al., ; Wess, ; Wess & Withers, ; Withers, ). Humans even regulated themselves, and their horses and wagons, to become instruments (Driver, ; Fleetwood, ; Raj, ).…”

“…Instruments, and their proper use, were crucial elements in guides to exploration (Herschel, ; Jackson, ) and in the emergence of method in science and geography (Driver, ; Wess & Withers, ; Withers, ). What is revealed here is the fact of instruments at work and their resultant “traces,” in print and in manuscript.…”

“…In another, it is about the place afforded instruments in authors’ accounts of what exploration involved – how explorer‐authors wrote about instruments. Explorers should have invested importance in them: the provision and proper use of scientific instruments was emphasised in guides to scientific method (Driver, ; Herschel, ; Jackson, ; Withers, ). Wess's () important survey of instrument provision by the Royal Geographical Society (RGS) shows that the society supported 436 expeditions in the century from 1830.…”

Geographies of the Book: Review and Prospect

“…For such “bookish travelers”, as Bleichmar (, p. 54) has described them, printed texts were “key instruments not only in educating…[their] eyes but also in [regulating] the day‐to‐day work” of exploration. The instructive qualities of such books were further refined—and made explicit—in the nineteenth century through the publication of practical manuals to in‐the‐field scientific and geographical practice (Driver ; Withers ).…”

“…[their] eyes but also in [regulating] the day-to-day work" of exploration. The instructive qualities of such books were further refined-and made explicit-in the nineteenth century through the publication of practical manuals to in-the-field scientific and geographical practice (Driver 1998;Withers 2013).…”