SoSe 14: Living Physics - Collectives, Sites, Historical Contexts
Elvira Scheich
Comments
A scientific collective can be characterized by its development of a specific thought style, its work place culture and gender performance, beliefs about professional quality and attitudes towards political environment. We will have a closer look at three distinct physics collectives, located at three different sites and embedded in three different historical periods:
(1) the physicists at the Cavendish Laboratory of the University of Cambridge around 1890;
(2) the circle of physicists working at the Kaiser-Wilhelm Institutes in Berlin in the 1920s;
(3) the group of theoretical physicists of Robert J. Oppenheimer working for the Radiation Laboratory of the University of California and their following careers up to the 1950s.
The materials for studying these collectives comprise biographical recollections of the involved men and women, historiographical accounts and socio- structural analyses.
close12 Class schedule
Regular appointments