Last week, @hssonline & @SocHistTech announced that this year's joint meeting in New Orleans had been postponed due to #COVID19.

Many people, including myself, were saddened by this decision, even though we agreed with it. After all, public health must take priority.

(1/20)

Why? These meetings provide opportunities to discover new trends in #histSTM scholarship, meet scholars w/shared interests, recognize the accomplishments of our peers, & reuniting w/old friends.

(Can we do these things virtually? Yes-but it's going to be very different!)

(2/20)

One of my favorite parts of attending HSS & SHOT's annual meetings is catching up w/ @LindaHall_org's research fellows. It's great to see how their scholarly interests have evolved since their time in #KCMO.

Normally I try to attend as many of their talks as I can...

(3/20)

Although that won't be possible this year, @hssonline and @SocHistTech have been kind enough to post the provisional programs for their respective meetings online!

HSS: https://hssmeeting.org/hss_program_2020.pdf
SHOT: https://www.historyoftechnology.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Program-website-version-24-june-2020.pdf

(4/20)

And that means that even though their presentations have been cancelled, I can still take a moment on #FellowFriday to highlight these scholars & the #histSTM talks they would have given if we had been able to gather in New Orleans.

Get ready...this is going to be good!

(5/20)

Most people only have the chance to chair one panel at a conference, @STS_News would have overseen two SHOT sessions in New Orleans!

1.) Automating a New Political Economy
2.) The Importance of Military Infrastructure: Temporary, Permanent, and In-Between

(6/20)

. @BarnetHalley (2018-19 LHL fellow) would have presented a paper on 18th c. philosopher David Hartley's "mental acoustics" as part of a session he organized on Physical Intermediaries between Mind and Brain from the 18th to 20th Centuries.

(7/20)

Space historian & 2018-19 LHL fellow @jordanbimm bridged the divide b/w the two conferences. He was slated to chair a SHOT session on " #Exploration & Warfare in Extreme Environments" **and** present an HSS paper on #astrobiology studies during the early #ColdWar!

(8/20)

Equine historian extraordinaire & 2018-19 LHL fellow @KatBoniface would present her paper (Trotting Time-Advances in Horsepower) as part of a SHOT panel on Science, Technology, #Innovation, and Sports.

(At the same time as @STS_News's panel? Not cool, Program Committee!)

(9/20)

By this point in the thread, I know that some of you are wondering, "All well and good, but where's Henri Bergson?"

Never fear-Extremely online 2018-19 LHL fellow @EtheHerring added some much needed élan vital/ #philsci to the HSS program w/a paper on Creative Evolution!

(10/20)

One of our most recent research fellows, N.J. Dharan, organized a roundtable on collaborative pedagogies for global #histsci for HSS.

He was also scheduled to share some of his research on #nitrogen production in an HSS/SHOT joint session on chemical histories!

(11/20)

. @em_hutcheson, 2019-20 LHL fellow and historian of marine biology, was scheduled to present an HSS paper on the production of scientific objects & inscriptions in the Dutch East Indies!

(I suspect coral reefs might have been involved...)

(12/20)

2019-20 LHL fellow @arider_ organized another crossover HSS/SHOT session: "Animal, Vegetable, Mineral: Material Tools for Archiving Time." Her talk would have focused on blue ice & planetary time.

(Another panelist, @MelissaCharenko, visited LHL as a @chstmorg fellow!)

(13/20)

Flashtalks are a relatively recent addition to the HSS & SHOT programs. This year, 2019-20 LHL fellow Tasha Schoenstein was going to share a quick (5-10 min.) talk on the early disciplinary history of computer science.

(14/20)

Clearly, there would have been lots of LHL fellows sharing their work in New Orleans!

And that's not including the HSS panel @KatieofReinhart & @_trisMEGistus organized on #histSTM fellowships, ft. @Adrianna_Link, Pedro Raposo, Daniel John Mitchell, Babak Ashrafi and...

(15/20)

(For those keeping track at home, I was also slated to chair a SHOT panel on Cultural Representations of Technology. No LHL fellows were in that session, but there would have been railroads publications, 1980s computing magazines, and computers on early TV comedies!)

(16/20)

These are just a few of the papers and panels that would have been on the program at this year's HSS & SHOT meetings.

They are an indicator of how amazing both conferences would have been & a reminder of the broad range of projects that LHL fellows have pursued.

(17/20)

We can only hope that by the fall of 2021, the #COVID19 pandemic will be under control, and historians of science and technology will be able to reconvene to share their work in person.

Needless to say, I am looking forward to seeing you all in New Orleans next year!

(18/20)

Until then, if you are interested in learning more about any of the @LindaHall_org research fellows referenced in this thread, please visit https://www.lindahall.org/fellowships/ .

Click on "Current Fellows" or "Former Fellows" for profiles of all our visiting scholars.

#histSTM

(19/20)

And if you want to learn more about LHL's fellowship program, feel free to tweet/DM me or email [email protected].

Thanks for reading this thread, and have a wonderful weekend!

(20/20)