Modern Nature

by Nyhart, Lynn K.

• ISBN13: 9780226610894
• ISBN10: 0226610896
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-05-01
• Publisher: Univ of Chicago Pr

Summary

InModern Nature,Lynn K. Nyhart traces the emergence of a "biological perspective" in late nineteenth-century Germany that emphasized the dynamic relationships among organisms, and between organisms and their environment. Examining this approach to nature in light of Germany's fraught urbanization and industrialization, as well the opportunities presented by new and reforming institutions, she argues that rapid social change drew attention to the role of social relationships and physical environments in rendering a societyand naturewhole, functional, and healthy. This quintessentially modern view of nature, Nyhart shows, stood in stark contrast to the standard naturalist's orientation toward classification. While this new biological perspective would eventually grow into the academic discipline of ecology,Modern Naturelocates its roots outside the universities, in a vibrant realm of populist natural history inhabited by taxidermists and zookeepers, schoolteachers and museum reformers, amateur enthusiasts and nature protectionists. Probing the populist beginnings of animal ecology in Germany, Nyhart unites the history of popular natural history with that of elite science in a new way. In doing so, she brings to light a major orientation in late nineteenth-century biology that has long been eclipsed by Darwinism.

Author Biography

Lynn K. Nyhart is professor of history of science at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and author of Biology Takes Form: Animal Morphology and the German University, 1800–1900, also published by the University of Chicago Press.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	p. xi
Introduction: The Biological Perspective and the Problem of a Modern Nature	p. 1
Identity, Mobility, and Place	p. 8
Popular Science and Populist Natural History	p. 15
The Biological Perspective and the History of Biology	p. 20
Ghosts and Shadows	p. 25
Tracing the Biological Perspective	p. 31
Bringing Life to Natural History	p. 35
Practical and Popular Natural History	p. 35
The Taxidermic Life	p. 38
Against the "Terrorism of System": Martin on Taxidermic Displays	p. 50
Stuttgart: Representing Nature for the Fatherland	p. 56
Commercial Displays: Nature as Spectacle	p. 61
Bringing Nature's Past to Life	p. 67
Public/Private, Science/Art, Elite/Popular: Natural History Institutions and Values	p. 74
The World in Miniature: Practical Natural History and the Zoo Movement	p. 79
The Zoo as a Cultural Institution	p. 83
Designing a World in Miniature	p. 92
Caring for Animals: From Daily Life to Nature Protection	p. 107
The Circulation of People and Ideas	p. 117
Conclusion	p. 123
From Practice to Theory: Karl Möet;bius and the Lebensgemeinschaft	p. 125
Karl Möet;bius: Upwardly Striving Youth	p. 127
Natural History in Hamburg	p. 130
Natural History Activist	p. 132
The Fauna of the Kiel Fjord	p. 138
From Hamburg to Kiel	p. 145
The Oyster and Oyster-Culture	p. 152
Conclusion: Social Mobility and Ecological Theory	p. 158
The "Living Community" in the Classroom	p. 161
Natural History and School Reform	p. 165
Friedrich Junge and The Village Pond	p. 173
The Spread of the Village Pond Gospel	p. 181
The Village Pond Curriculum as Heimatkunde	p. 192
Conclusion	p. 195
Reforming the Natural History Museum, 1880-1900	p. 198
The Emergence of the Professional Curator	p. 203
The Institutional Landscape	p. 214
Dual Arrangement	p. 223
The Museum as a Center for Biological Knowledge	p. 240
Conclusion	p. 246
Biological Groups, Nature, and Culture in the Museum	p. 251
The Kunde Projects	p. 253
The Museum füet;r Natur-, Vöet;lker-, und Handelskunde in Bremen (1896)	p. 257
The Altona City Museum (1901) and Heimatkunde	p. 268
The Museum füet;r Meereskunde (1906)	p. 278
Biological Groups, Modernity, and the Representation of Nature	p. 289
From Biology to Ecology	p. 293
Biologie and Secondary School Reform	p. 295
Biologie as Popular Natural History	p. 307
From Biology to Ecology	p. 314
Pedagogical, Popular, and Professional Ecology	p. 320
Museum Research and the Rise of Ecological Animal Geography	p. 323
Exploring Life in the Ocean	p. 325
Making Animal Geography Ecological	p. 333
Ecological versus Historical Zoogeography	p. 344
Ecological Animal Geography and the German Natural History Museum	p. 352
Modern Nature	p. 355
Bibliography	p. 369
Index	p. 413
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