🪺🐦⬛ #KWIBlog: Another brief interlude from our #Fäden series, this time featuring an intriguing perspective on bird nests. KWI International Fellow @mattholmes.bsky.social investigates the intertwining of human and non-human life forms. 🔗 blog.kulturwissenschaften.de/life-finds-a... #birds
Matthew Holmes
@mattholmes.bsky.social
Historian of Science, Technology, and the Environment https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8498-3264 Author of "The Graft Hybrid: Challenging Twentieth-Century Genetics" @upittpress.bsky.social #HistSTM #EnvHist #HistTech #AnimalHistory matthewrholmes.com
Excited to announce with @eguimont.bsky.social that the newest issue of Endeavour is live! We have some great articles for your summer reading. First, @farsouthhistory.bsky.social on the geopolitics of continental drift and Southern Hemisphere scientists: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
sciencedirect.com
The articles in our Endeavour special issue are starting to arrive! Check out research from @mattholmes.bsky.social & @arnoldke.bsky.social which are now available open access! www.sciencedirect.com/special-issu... #envhist #envhums #histsci #collections #museums
Endeavour | Collection Ecologies - Environmental Histories of Science in Museums and Collections | ScienceDirect.com by Elsevier
The special issue proposes a new environmental history of the sciences manifested in a critical examination of the pasts and futures of collections. It crosses disciplinary boundaries to re-assess the...
sciencedirect.com
Very pleased to share my new article on the legal case surrounding Welwitsch's Angolan botanical collections, part of the @collecol.bsky.social issue in @Endeavour (edited by the lovely @dominikhhh.bsky.social & @nickytheprof.bsky.social) ✨ #envhist Available open access! doi.org/10.1016/j.en...
💐 A warm welcome to Essen! We are delighted to introduce our 12th KWI International Fellow Cohort: @oliviaglaze.bsky.social, @mattholmes.bsky.social, Ciarán Kavanagh, Floramente SJ Ponce, @rublehistory.bsky.social, and Christoph Schaub (Thyssen@KWIFellow)! More about their work: tinyurl.com/yjw7nzcb
I think it's probably time to announce that me and @colinhoag.bsky.social are the incoming Editors of Environmental Humanities journal, published by @dukepress.bsky.social . Huge thanks to Franklin Ginn & @dollyjorgensen.bsky.social for all their work as Eds, & for patiently showing us the ropes!
Are you in UK and want to hear about my book Ghosts Behind Glass? 3 public talks in Feb: Cambridge Museum of Zoology, 11 Feb www.museum.zoo.cam.ac.uk/events/talk-... M Shed Bristol, 12 Feb www.bristolmuseums.org.uk/whats-on/m-s... Oxford NatHist Museum, 13 Feb www.oumnh.ox.ac.uk/event/dead-a...
Ghosts Behind Glass
How museums display extinct species—and what these exhibits say about us. While it’s no longer possible to encounter a dodo in the wild, we can still come face-to-face with them in museums. The rema...
press.uchicago.edu
The ancient trick of grafting one plant onto another could find a very modern use – enabling gene editing of plants that are very difficult or impossible to edit by other means.
Grafting trick could let us gene-edit a huge variety of plants
Many plants including cocoa, coffee and avocado cannot be gene-edited but a technique involving grafting could change that, opening the door to more productive and nutritious varieties
newscientist.com
The Greenhouse @unistavanger.bsky.social is launching an international Masters Program in Public Environmental Humanities from fall 2026! Taught in English. Please share with all your students, #envhist #envhum colleagues! Learn more about the program here: www.uis.no/en/studies/t...
"Ghosts Behind Glass offers valuable insights into humanity’s grappling with our own hand in irrevocable loss, but the delight of the book is much simpler: as Jørgensen globetrots, we experience the museums and extinct species she visits through her enchanted gaze." lit.newcity.com/2025/10/30/s...
Review: "Ghosts Behind Glass: Encountering Extinction in Museums" by Dolly Jørgensen
A book rich in observations drawn from visits to over eighty museums worldwide, “Ghosts Behind Glass” glimpses at how they present extinction to the public.
lit.newcity.com
So great to see my new book How Plague Got Rats: Mastering a Zoonotic Pandemic, published OA @hopkinspress.bsky.social next May, has got a cover! www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/...
I looked through my “extinction in museums” files and discovered that I have encountered a slender-billed curlew at the Museum of Natural History, University of Wrocław, Poland. Now gets added to the list of extinct animals.
Well, it's official. After our paper last year (onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....), the Slender-billed Curlew is officially declared Extinct today. Scientists dream of describing new species, not writing their obituary and epitaph, knowing that they are gone forever #ornithology
@collecol.bsky.social is back! 🪲 We've put together a great seminar series - we hope you'll come along! On 2 Oct 11am EDT/4pm GMT we're doing a reading club - Appadurai's "The Museum, the Colony, and the Planet: Territories of the Imperial Imagination". All info ⬇️ www.chstm.org/group/collec...
Collection Ecologies | Consortium for History of Science, Technology and Medicine
chstm.org
New on H-Sci-Med-Tech: Check out Eric J. Richards (@btiscience.bsky.social)’s review of @mattholmes.bsky.social’s book _The Graft Hybrid: Challenging Twentieth-Century Genetics_ pub 2024 @upittpress.bsky.social #HSTM Review available @hnetreviews.bsky.social www.h-net.org/reviews/show...
h-net.org
New book review: Richards on Holmes, Matthew: _Graft Hybrid: Challenging Twentieth-Century Genetics, The_. University of Pittsburgh Press, 2023. Published by H-Sci-Med-Tech. Read here: networks.h-net.org/node/20126496
Had a really good time at the Planetary Futures conference in Manchester. Big thanks to wonderful organizers @sadiahqureshi.bsky.social, @duncanwilson78.bsky.social and presenters! Snapshots from talks🧵 @mattholmes.bsky.social @angecass.bsky.social #envhist #envhum #histsci
Join us Mon 1 Sept 2025 for @greenhouseuis.net #envhum book talk with @richardfallon.bsky.social on Contesting Earth’s History in Transatlantic Literary Culture 1860-1935: Believers & Visionaries on the Borderlines of Geology & Palaeontology (Oxford UP 2025). newnatures.org/greenhouse/e... #histsci
excited to share the call for the workshop EXTRACTIVE NATURES / NATURES OF EXTRACTION happening at @uobrisceh.bsky.social on 6-7 Nov 2025, made possible by the @britishacademy.bsky.social deadline: 10 September! full call below ⤵ #envhist #envhum
I have a horrible feeling I forgot to post that registration for this conference about extinction, conservation and the future of our planet is now open. We have an amazing range of speakers, who are listed here, alongside the link to register. networks.h-net.org/group/announ...
Registration open for Planetary Futures conference at the University of Manchester, 18-19 September 2025 | H-Net
General registration is now open for the Planetary Futures conference, which takes place at the University of Manchester on the 18th and 19th of September 2025.
networks.h-net.org
If you would like to review my book for a publication, get in touch! The book is a history of wind energy and I’m trying to get it out to as wide an audience as possible. manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk/9781526182968/
Manchester University Press - Electric wind
Electric wind - Browse and buy the Paperback edition of Electric wind by Marianna Dudley
manchesteruniversitypress.co.uk
Make sure to read @monicavasile.bsky.social's wonderful new article in Environmental Humanities - arguing we should think of reintroduction projects not as a form of 'homecoming', but as 'homemaking'. #MovingAnimals read.dukeupress.edu/environmenta...
Beyond Homecoming | Environmental Humanities | Duke University Press
read.dukeupress.edu
The Humanities and Technology Association (HTA) have published a Call for Papers for their 43rd annual Humanities and Technology Association Conference, held at Salve Regina University in Newport, Rhode Island from Oct. 23-25th, 2025.
What a great roundtable! @collecol.bsky.social!
Had a fabulous time at #BSHS2025 @bshsnews.bsky.social . #HistSTM So much on #museums , #collections , #envhist #HistNatHist . 😍 Great seeing friends & meeting new people. Esp. @camglamresearch.bsky.social Thanks everyone for attending our @collecol.bsky.social roundtable. Join please:
📢 The #BiodiversityHeritageLibrary is entering a bold new chapter – and we need your help! Today we release our official Call for Support. We’re seeking new hosts for BHL’s staff, infrastructure, and services. Learn more: blog.biodiversitylibrary.org/2025/06/tran... #BHLTransition #ILoveBHL
Please consider supporting the Biodiversity Heritage Library! #envhist #envhum
CALL FOR SUPPORT: Secure the Future of BHL Following the Smithsonian Institution’s decision to conclude its long-standing role as BHL’s host on 1 January 2026. #HistSTM #HistSci #Biodiversity #Ecology #EnvHist #NatHist #EnvironmentalStudies about.biodiversitylibrary.org/call-for-sup...
I’m very happy to announce that I’ve been awarded an IRFD Starting Grant for the project “Sovereign Flowers: Flora Danica and the Emergence of the National Flora, 1750–1900.” Hooray! The project allows me to build a small research group of a PhD student and a postdoc at Aarhus University (@au.dk).
Absolute Units returns!!! In this ep, we speak to environmental historian @dollyjorgensen.bsky.social about her research into pigs in medieval England. Topics include: taking your hogs for a walk, the Hapsburg chin of domestic pigs, Babe 2, and so much more. merl.reading.ac.uk/explore/abso...
📣 Join historian Sadiah Qureshi as she shares insights from Vanished, her acclaimed new book on extinction, empire & erasure for free! With an introduction by Helen Macdonald, author of H is for Hawk! 🗓 Wed 9 July, 6–10pm 📍 Cambridge 🎟 www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/1395979053... #PublicLecture #histSTM
I'm editing the Food (& Drink) Section for Environmental Change and Human Experience for OUP Intersections. Looking for new work on food, drink and the environment. Contact me if you want to learn more. It is peer-reviewed. academic.oup.com/oxford-inter...
Interesting role for a Historian or Arts/Humanities scholar to join at a senior level in the research team; overlapping specialities required: Early Modern, history of enslavement, country house history, plant humanities.
Job researching plants and enslavement www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DNK213/s...
Join us & let‘s workshop together! #envhum #collections #museum
🚨 Don't miss our final CHSTM seminar of the academic year! 12 June at 12pm EST/5pm BST ✨ @dominikhhh.bsky.social & @nickytheprof.bsky.social will be workshopping our forthcoming special issue with Endeavour! 🪲 Sign up to get all your @collecol.bsky.social info! www.chstm.org/group/collec...