Agenda UV

Contact area between the history of farming and the history of science: Prospects of analysis, case studies and future projects

Valencia, IILP, Palau de Cerveró, 20^th September 2019

Organising committee: José Ramón Bertomeu, Salvador Calatayud and Ximo Guillem

In the last years, large amounts of works about the agricultural, economic, science and technology history have been published. The interest on the history of agriculture due to the problems of the technological change has been discussed in congresses, articles and collective books. The appearance of new techniques and its implementation in different sociocultural contexts and ecological environments has increased the interest in the production and use of agricultural technology, as well as its several economic and environmental consequences. From the history of science, the interest for the social consequences of techno-science has led to research several socio-material products and their passage through industry and agriculture, such as genetically improved seeds, pesticides or fertilizers. This has allowed the appearance of researchers who have shared sources, problems, contexts and themes. These lines of research have been developed independently, given that both communities have magazines and conferences of their own, where there is little involvement of researchers of other areas. This situation has been compensated in the last year with an increasing number of meeting points. An example of this growing interest is the collective work published in 2018 in the magazine Agricultural History.

The meeting “Contact areas” aims to strengthen the meetings between the history of agriculture and the history of science, as well as other related areas that have approached these themes. The objective is to collect a few studies that have researched about the Iberian Peninsula during the 20^th century, without excluding other contexts to promote comparisons. The works must offer a new state of the issues to present the most recent tendencies to the people of other fields. Case studies will be presented, although a comprehensive description of the approaches, revisions, debates and lines of research are necessary. The presentations will be brief (around 20 minutes) to encourage the exchange of ideas and debate.

The conference will count on the participation of:  Lino Camprubí (Universidad de Sevilla), Xavier Cussó (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona), Josep Espluga Trenc (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona), Lourenzo Fernández Prieto (Universidade de Santiago de Compostela), Juan Infante Amate (Universidad Pablo de Olavide, de Sevilla), Marta Macedo (Instituto de Ciências Sociais da Universidade de Lisboa), Juan Pan-Montojo (Universidad Autónoma de Madrid). Anyone who is interested can participate. No previous registration is required. The conference will be broadcasted online at: reunion.uv.es/hcc2.