Registration is now open for I-CHORA 5, co- organized by The National Archives of England, Wales and the United Kingdom, Liverpool University Centre for Archive Studies and the Department of Information Studies at University College London. The I-CHORA series began in Toronto in 2003 and continued in Amsterdam, Boston and Perth; it has become the pre-eminent conference for the history of all aspects of recordkeeping principles and practice.

I-CHORA5 will be held in London, with the theme ‘Records, archives and technology: interdependence over time’.  Thirty speakers from throughout Europe, North America and Australia will address subjects ranging from the early recordkeeping technologies of Peru, through medieval recordkeeping in Venice and Tudor recordkeeping in England, to the nineteenth century British civil service and twentieth century Spain. Keynote papers will be given by Gary Urton (Harvard University), Barbara Craig (University of Toronto), and Paul Luff and Christian Heath (King’s College London).

A special rate of £150 is available for delegates registering before 30th April, and covers all conference sessions, visits, and the conference dinner and reception. Day rates of £75 are available, with a concessionary day rate of £25 for students.

The full conference programme and online registration form is available at http://www.liv.ac.uk/ichora5/ . Further enquiries should be addressed to the conference administrator Charlotte Harrison (c.e.swire@liverpool.ac.uk).

NYU’s Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health seeks a one-year visiting professor in food systems or sustainability. The NYU Food Studies program takes an interdisciplinary approach to studying food production and consumption, particularly in urban settings. The program examines the complexities of supplying the city, including food distribution and transportation, water and waste management, and the rural/urban interface. Policy and health issues are also germane to food systems.

Qualifications: Doctorate in related field, teaching experience, record of research. We are willing to consider candidates with a range of research interests, which may include: environmental studies; urban studies or planning with a concentration in the rural/urban interface; waste and/or water management; public policy (i.e., agricultural policy and urban markets); political or cultural geography; agroecology; landscape design with a focus on the northeast.

Responsibilities: We are seeking candidates who can contribute to the NYU food studies program, particularly courses in the masters’ program food systems concentration. The candidate will be expected to be an active teacher and to engage in the intellectual life of the program and the department. The position is to begin September 1, 2010.

Applications: Please apply online by providing a cover letter including a list of three references and their email addresses (letters are not required at this time), CV, related syllabi/course outlines, publications (as appropriate) to:  Food Systems Program, Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health, New York University, School of Culture, Education, and Human Development, 35 West 4^th Street, 10^th Floor, New York, NY 10012. Information about NYU food studies can be found at: http://steinhardt.nyu.edu/nutrition/food/ma

Apply online at: http://www.nyuopsearch.com/applicants/Central?quickFind=50489

Applications due: April 1, 2010. 

New York University is an Equal Opportunity Employer and is committed to building a culturally diverse educational environment.

The Metropolitan Waterworks Museum is located in the historic Chestnut Hill Pumping Station on Beacon Street in Boston.  The museum is a volunteer-based community organization that will offer exhibitions and programs exploring the many challenges involved in providing water resources to meet the ever-expanding needs of a growing metropolitan area from the 19th to the 21st century.

The successful candidate for the Executive Director of this new museum, targeted to open in Fall 2010, will have enthusiasm for the historical, technical, and architectural subject matter of the museum and its educational mission. A local design firm with a national reputation is guiding the development of multiple exhibitions.

We seek an Executive Director who is an entrepreneurial and creative thinker, with a solid background of effective staff and volunteer management and proven skills in goal-setting, problem-solving, collaborating, and contract administration.  S/he must have experience with business, finance and operational management and be able to develop policies and procedures essential for the successful launching of this new enterprise.

The successful candidate will be expected to reach out to the museum’s many and diverse audiences to build long-term relationships and broaden the base of financial support for current operations and future initiatives.  Consequently, s/he must be an effective and dynamic spokesperson in the community and with the media.  S/he will be expected to work effectively with the Board of Directors and our many stakeholders and supporters.

The Waterworks Museum Executive Director is a full time appointment with a competitive salary. The Executive Director works closely with the Board’s Executive Committee, and reports directly to the Chair of the Executive Committee.

Interested candidates should their résumé and letter of introduction to search@waterworks-museum.org by 12 of March 2010.

The fellow will be associated with the project: “Two-Year Colleges and the Invention of Nano-Labor: Between Promise and Possibility,” a multi-department National Science Foundation-funded study on the social origins and impacts of nano-focused economic development and training, and their implications for technical workforces. The successful candidate will carry out research associated with the project; have possible opportunities to teach 1 or 2 courses in applicant’s discipline or related fields, and may develop his or her own research as well.

Candidates should possess a PhD in any of the following areas: sociology or history of science and technology; science and technology studies; labor history; American history; sociology or history of education; and race studies or race theory.

Qualified applicants should submit the following materials online through Drexeljobs.com: (1) a current CV, (2) two research papers or dissertation chapters, (3) the names and contact information for three references, and (4) a brief cover letter.   Please address cover letter to Drs. Amy Slaton and Mary Ebeling. Any inquiries in regards to the position can be sent to slatonae@drexel.edu. Review of applications will begin March 15, 2010.

Drexel University is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer. The University is especially interested in qualified candidates who can contribute to the diversity and excellence of the academic community.

The Center for Culture, History, and Environment (CHE) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison is pleased to be hosting WHEATS in Fall 2010. Now in its seventh year, the Workshop for the History of Environment, Agriculture, Technology, and Science (WHEATS) brings together graduate students studying the history of the environment, agriculture, science, or technology. WHEATS is open to submissions from any discipline with interests in these fields. Papers – generally 25-30 pages – are circulated in advance to all participants, and at the workshop papers receive feedback from participants and senior scholars through a roundtable discussion. This format is well suited for works in progress, and the workshop will have sessions on professional development as well as opportunities to meet and engage members of the broader CHE community.

Due to logistical constraints, papers must be in English. UW-Madison will provide housing, food, and some funding to help defray travel costs. Potential participants should submit a one-page abstract (200 words) and short curriculum vitae by April 15, 2010.  All submissions will be acknowledged by e-mail.  Applicants should note their year of graduate study or Ph.D. completion date. Accepted papers will be due August 31, 2010.

For further information contact:
Amrys Williams
aowilliams@wisc.edu

Visit website:
http://envhist.wisc.edu/wheats

Send submissions to:
Kellen Backer
kbacker@wisc.edu

The German Society for the History of Medicine, Natural Science, and Technology (DGGMNT), together with the German Society for the History of Technology (GTG) would like to invite papers and panels for their combined annual conference on the theme of Nutrition, Eating and Drinking in the History of Medicine, Science and Technology.

Nutrition is a total phenomenon in history. Eating and drinking determine the everyday experience of every human being for their entire lives.  Taking a meal at a specific times of day shapes the organization of daily routine and shapes the bodily rhythm of digestion and absorption of nutrients. At the same time, rhythms of work structure our eating rhythms. Food and rituals of eating and drinking have been expressions of hybrid cultural activities since the earliest civilizations, where religion and science, culture and nature, ratio and emotio intersect and overlap.

The combined meeting of the DGGMT and GTG would like to approach this topic from the perspective of the history of science, technology and medicine. The organizers are seeking contributions that discuss the role of science and technology in the research, analysis, production, preservation, transport, distribution, consumption and disposal of foodstuffs. Besides exploring these more instrumental relationships between science, technology and food, we are further interested in how eating and drinking habits have changed in the course of the scientification, mechanization, and industrialization of our food cultures, and the medical, scientific and dietetic debates that have shaped and/or criticized these processes.

The conference represents a forum for critical discussion of different disciplinary approaches as well as differing epochal points of emphasis. Contributions can explore themes such as:

• the relationship of body, nutrition and the scientific definition of health;
• the history of dietetics and the medical-philosophical concepts of healthy eating and/or harmful substances and eating habits;
• discovery, production and consumption of ersatz foods, artificial flavours or flavour enhancers;
• the transfer of the logic of industrial systems to the production, distribution and consumption of foodstuffs and their consequences;
• Security and danger – the role of medicine, science and technology in the institutionalization of trust in foodstuffs;
• development, implementation and consequences of packaging and preservation technologies.
• phases of scientific research, instruments and theories for determining, analysing and explaining the effects of nourishment in the human body (eg. energie and substance levels, holistic theories, etc.)
• scientific nutrition research within and between the fields of physiology, medicine, chemistry and physics;
• nutrition science and politics: food and nutrition in the context of colonization, totalitarian regimes, development aid and international (aid) organizations;
• political and ideological discourses of health or danger of specific foodstuffs of eating and drinking rituals;
• Causes and effects of historical cases of hunger or abundance;
• influence of scientification, mechanization, and industrialization on eating and drinking habits

Proposals for individual papers or panels of 3- 4 people (2 papers, 1 commentator and 1 chair, or 3 papers and 1 chair) are welcome. In putting together panels, please leave ample time for discussion (session times are set at 90 minutes in total).

Applications for individual papers should be accompanied by an abstract (1 page maximum). Proposals for panels should include individual abstracts plus a general description of the panel. Abstracts should be sent by 31 March 2010 to: PD Dr. Sabine Schleiermacher. Email: sabine.schleiermacher@charite.de 

In addition, the GTG is putting together a poster forum for PhD candidates in the history of technology independent of the conference theme.  Prizes will be awarded for the best presentations.  Proposals for posters should be sent to Dr. Stefan Krebs (s.krebs@tue.nl) by 31 March 2010, who will provide further information on the process.  A separate call for posters for this session will also be published.

This lecture series brings together architects and historians to discuss the relationship between design and the formation of a culture attuned to environmental issues. Speakers and topics include:

• Feb 17: David Benjamin, The Living
  Proof
  Art Classroom 1, 5 pm
• March 15: Janette Kim, All of the Above
  Counting Carbon: Expanding the Logic of Efficiency
  Art Classroom 1, 5 pm
• March 17: Peder Anker, New York University
  Spaceship Earth: A History of Ecological Designs
  Hallock Auditorium, 7pm
• April 6: Felicity Scott, Columbia University
  Woodstockholm
  Hallock Auditorium, 7pm
• April 12: Charles, Harvard University
  Planning, Ecology, and the Emergence of Landscape
  Hallock Auditorium, 7pm
• May 3: Brendan Moran, Syracuse University
  Architecture of the Educational Environment
  Art Classroom 1, 5 pm

Funded by The Clarence Ward Architecture Lecture Fund of the Oberlin College Art Department. All lectures take place on the campus of Oberlin College, Oberlin Ohio. Organized by Daniel Barber, Visiting Instructor of Modern Architectural History. For additional information: danielbarber@earthlink.net

The Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West (ICW) and the Department of History at the University of Southern California together seek applications from recent PhDs for a new one-year postdoctoral teaching fellowship, with possibility of an additional year reappointment, beginning in the fall of 2010. The Institute on California and the West is a research and teaching collaboration between the Huntington Library and the University of Southern California (www.usc.edu/icw).

The postdoctoral position will include research activities at the Huntington Library and teaching at the USC College of Letters, Arts & Sciences. The fellowship is part of the Aerospace History Project, which is documenting the history of Southern California aerospace through archival collections and oral history, with a variety of historical perspectives from technology to labor, social history, popular culture, and the environment. Fellows may capitalize on the new archival collections for their research and will assist with the oral history program. Candidates should have background in aerospace history; history of science and technology; history of California and the West; or relevant fields; experience with oral history is desirable. Candidates must have completed their PhD by June 2010, or have been awarded their Ph.D. within five years of initial appointment. The fellowship is primarily funded by the National Science Foundation. Fellows will be hired as University of Southern California employees and receive university benefits and a competitive salary.

To apply, please send a letter of application, c.v., thesis abstract, no more than two thesis chapters, and two letters of reference to:
Peter Westwick, Director
Aerospace History Project
Huntington-USC Institute on California and the West
The Huntington Library
1151 Oxford Road, San Marino, CA  91108

Review of completed applications will begin March 1, 2010.

Inquiries may be sent to westwick@usc.edu

The University of Southern California strongly values diversity and is committed to equal opportunity in employment.  Women and men, and members of all racial and ethnic groups, are encouraged to apply.

Following the award of an extended programme of AHRC Collaborative PhD Studentships, the University of Exeter, in partnership with Porthcurno Telegraph Museum, is seeking to appoint a suitably qualified applicant for a doctoral studentship for three years commencing on 1 October 2010. The overall theme of the extended programme is “Themes in the Historical Geography of Communication: the Eastern Telegraph Company to Cable and Wireless, 1869-1945”. Of the three PhD projects identified under this broad theme, one started in October 2008 (Visual Culture and the Making of Corporate Identity), another in October 2009 (Entwined business and imperial histories), and the remaining project will commence in October 2010. The principal supervisor will be Professor Catherine Brace and the second supervisor will be Dr Nicola Thomas.

Project Outline: During the Second World War, the operations of Cable and Wireless were critical; governments co-ordinated policy, broadcasters received the latest war news and families exchanged messages with men fighting overseas.  Cables lent a tactical advantage; they could not be intercepted as radio signals could, though cables were frequently cut.  At the beginning of the war, Cable and Wireless had over 200 stations worldwide. Fourteen cables came ashore at Porthcurno.  Cable and Wireless staff overseas were drafted into a uniformed unit named ‘Telecom’, created with War Office co-operation. The relationship between government and private business was renegotiated in light of the strategic importance of the company’s assets and activities which allowed the integration of intelligence with decision-making. In 1937 the British government pressured the company to dismiss all foreigners employed in cable stations in the British Empire.  Together, the British Government and Cable and Wireless devised a ‘scrutiny scheme’ which used the Official Secrets Act of 1920 to sanction telegraphers to read cable slip and retransmit useful information to London (Headrick, 1991). None of these aspects of the company’s activities has previously been researched in any critical depth, and are only fleetingly covered in Headrick’s (1991) account of telecommunications and international relations. Research Questions – it is anticipated that the project shall address questions such as:

• What was the wartime role of Cable and Wireless in the UK and overseas?
• How were distant cable stations mobilised in the war effort?
• What was the company’s participation in secret activities, code breaking and intelligence?
• How does the company’s wartime activity in censorship, cable scrutiny and radio interception help us to understand the relationship between private commercial enterprise and the operations of government?
• What can we learn about the place of global telecommunications in the strategic and tactical issues that emerged in wartime, using the case study of Cable and Wireless?
• To what extent did Cable and Wireless use the circumstances of war to resist the commercial threat of wireless communications, and secure competitive advantage?

Under the terms of the AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Award Scheme, the successful applicant will benefit from opportunities to work closely with Porthcurno Telegraph Museum team, who are responsible for the management and promotion of the museum and its activities. This will involve gaining first-hand experience of working on the management of the collection instead of simply viewing it as a scholarly resource. The experience of working with this collection will enhance the employment-related skills and training of the doctoral student.

Specific skills related to the handling, preservation and organisation of fragile archive material will be augmented by more generic skills transferable into any workplace such as negotiating between priorities, managing time and resources, working to a brief, working with others, and communicating findings to expert and lay audiences. A key feature of this collaborative project is that the student will have the opportunity to communicate the outputs of the PhD research to non-academic audiences through, for example, exhibitions, WebPages, leaflets and talks.

This project should interest applicants with backgrounds in diverse disciplines and subject areas, including, for example, cultural geography, historical geography, history. Applicants should hold a 1st Class or Upper 2nd Class Honours degree in a relevant discipline. A Master’s degree, either held or in progress, in a relevant area, would be an advantage. The successful applicant will further benefit from working within a lively and expanding research environment within the School of Geography at the University of Exeter’s Cornwall Campus near Falmouth in Cornwall.

The award will cover University tuition fees and provide a maintenance award of at least £13,290 per year for three years. The terms and conditions of the award will be those of the AHRC’s postgraduate studentships. Applicants must therefore have a relevant connection with the United Kingdom, usually through residence.  For further information, or informal discussion about the position, please contact: Professor Catherine Brace (email cbrace@exeter.ac.uk).

Applications: In order to apply you will need to complete an online web form where you must submit some personal details and upload a full CV, covering letter and details of 2 referees. Your covering letter should outline your academic interests, prior research experience and reasons for wishing to undertake this project.
If you have any general enquiries about the application process please email Helen Pisarska geog-studentships@exeter.ac.uk or phone +44(0)1392 723310. The closing date is 12 noon Monday 19th April 2010.  Interviews are likely to be held over two days on 24th and 25th May 2010. Applicants will be required to attend on both days.

Experiment And Experience: Ancient Egypt in the Present is a conference where those interested in ancient Egypt or in technology (academics, craftspeople and the general public) can meet and share their common enthusiasm. All ages and abilities are welcome. An array of demonstrations and talks include flint knapping, flower arranging, textiles, and shipbuilding, as well as woodworking, stoneworking, manufacturing of ritual clay artefacts, antler bow manufacture, glassworking, an oral performance, and of course mummification!

Experimental archaeology applies the scientific method and has the potential to be a powerful interdisciplinary research tool. Along with experiential approaches, it is an excellent medium for educating and widening participation. This conference aims to integrate the arts, humanities and sciences through a series of lectures, workshops and practical demonstrations that explore the value of a hands-on approach to understanding the past generally and Ancient Egypt in particular.

Hosted by CEMA, Egypt Centre and the Department of History and Classics, Swansea University 9am Monday 10th through Wednesday 12th May 2010 Faraday A , Swansea University.

Please see http://www.swan.ac.uk/egypt/conference010.htm for the full announcement, programme and booking form.

Carolyn Graves-Brown
Curator
Egypt Centre
Swansea University
Singleton Park
Swansea
SA2 8PP