CRASSH

Thursday 24 June
Mill Lane Lecture Room 1

17.00-19.00

Keynote Lecture

Professor James Elkins (School of the Art Institute of Chicago)
The Variable Relation of Photography and Science

Introduction
Professor Paul Binski (Faculty of Architecture and History of Art, University of Cambridge)

Followed by a reception at CRASSH

Friday 25 June
CRASSH 

9.00 - 9.45

Introduction
Dr Katrina Dean, John Falconer and Mirjam Brusius (The British Library)
The Talbot Collection at the British Library

Lacock Abbey and the country house archive/The Talbot Collection at the British Library/Talbot’s notebooks. A short survey

9.45 - 11.00

Keynote lecture

Professor Larry J. Schaaf (Baltimore, Maryland)
Lady Elisabeth's Henry

Introduction:  Professor Jennifer Tucker (Weslyan University)

11.00 - 11.30

Tea/coffee break

11.30 - 12.45

Session 1: Foundations: Mathematics and Antiquity
     
Dr Tony Crilly (University of Middlesex)
Talbot and the Cambridge Tripos

Dr David Gange (Cambridge Victorian Studies Group, University of Cambridge)
The Antiquity of Genesis and the Origins of Civilisation

Chair
Dr Steve Edwards (The Open University)

13.45 - 15.15 

Session 2: Knowledge Practices: Observation and Notetaking

Dr John van Wyhe (University of Cambridge/National University of Singapore)
Making Scientific Notes in the 19th Century: The Notebooks of Darwin and Wallace

Dr Anne Secord (University of Cambridge)
Talbot's First Lens: Botanical Vision as an Exact Science

Chair
Dr Katrina Dean (The British Library)

15.15 - 15.45 

Tea/coffee break 

15.45 - 17.15 

Session 3: Gentlemanly Pursuits: Antiquarianism and Literature

Mirjam Brusius (University of Cambridge/The British Library)
Preserving the Forgotten: Talbot and the Antique

Professor Graham Smith (University of St. Andrews)
In Scott's Shadow:Talbot and the Wizard of the North

Chair
Roger Watson (Fox Talbot Museum, Lacock Abbey)
 

17.15 - 18.00 

Commentary and discussion (chair as above)

Professor James A. Secord (Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge)

18.15 - 19.15 

Reception and visit to the exhibition of Talbot facsimiles at Trinity College (Wren Library)
For conference speakers and paying delegates who have pre-booked

19.30 

Conference dinner at St John's College (Wordsworth Room)
For speakers and paying delegates who have pre-booked

Saturday 26 June
CRASSH 

9.00 - 10.30

Session 4: Tracing Origins: Etymology and Decipherment

Professor Anatoly Liberman (University of Minnesota)
Talbot as a Student of Word Origins

Dr Eleanor Robson (University of Cambridge)
Bel, the Dragon, and Henry Fox Talbot: deciphering cuneiform after decipherment

Chair
Dr David Gange (Wolfson College/Cambridge Victorian Studies Group, University of Cambridge)

11.00 - 12.30

Session 5:  Image and inscription in Talbot's Scientific Network

Dr Chitra Ramalingam (CRASSH, University of Cambridge)
The Most Transitory of Things: Talbot and the Optics of the Instantaneous Image

Professor Frank James (Royal Institution, London)
Images of Faraday: Photography at the Royal Institution

Chair
Dr Kelley Wilder (DeMontfort University, Leicester )

13.30 - 15.00

Session 6: Re-reading “The Pencil of Nature”

Professor Vered Maimon (Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
Talbot's Art of Discovery

Professor Robin Kelsey (Harvard University)
The Photograph as Sign in The Pencil of Nature

Chair
Professor Roger Taylor (De Montfort University, Leicester) 

15.15 - 16.00 

Commentary and final discussion

Professor Simon Schaffer (Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge)

Chair
Dr Chitra Ramalingam (CRASSH, University of Cambridge)