Isis (journal)

Isis (journal) is a quarterly peer-reviewed periodical devoted to the history of science, medicine, and technology. Founded in 1913, it serves as the flagship publication of the History of Science Society and publishes research, archival studies, historiographical essays, and book reviews. Contributors and readers have included scholars affiliated with institutions such as Harvard University, University of Cambridge, University of Oxford, Princeton University, and University of Chicago.

History

Founded by George Sarton in 1913, the journal emerged amid intellectual currents linked to the American Historical Association and the British Society for the History of Science. Early contributors included figures associated with Johns Hopkins University, Columbia University, and University of Pennsylvania, while correspondents reached networks centered on Paris, Berlin, and Vienna. During the interwar years the journal intersected with debates triggered by the World War I aftermath, the professionalization represented by the American Philosophical Society, and the emergence of specialized bibliography in collections like the Bibliothèque nationale de France. In the post-World War II era Isis reflected transformations shaped by institutions such as the Smithsonian Institution, the Royal Society, and the Max Planck Society. Editorial stewardship passed through generations of historians who also held chairs at Yale University, Columbia University, Stanford University, University of California, Berkeley, and University of Michigan.

Scope and Content

Isis covers scholarship on figures, institutions, and events including studies of Isaac Newton, Galileo Galilei, Charles Darwin, Marie Curie, Albert Einstein, Louis Pasteur, James Clerk Maxwell, Johannes Kepler, and Ada Lovelace. It publishes work on archives from repositories such as the Library of Congress, Bodleian Library, British Library, Wellcome Collection, and Vatican Library, and on material culture found in museums like the Science Museum, London and the Deutsches Museum. The journal encompasses research on movements and occasions including the Scientific Revolution, the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, the Industrial Revolution, and the Manhattan Project, as well as case studies tied to observatories such as Royal Greenwich Observatory and laboratories at the Cavendish Laboratory. Articles frequently engage with primary sources from collections at the Royal Society of London, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and university archives at Trinity College, Cambridge.

Editorial and Publication Details

Published by the University of Chicago Press for the History of Science Society, the journal issues four numbers annually and includes research articles, review essays, bibliographies, and the long-running "Isis Current Bibliography" section. Editors have been drawn from faculties at Harvard University, University of Pennsylvania, Princeton University, Yale University, and Columbia University, and advisory boards have included members associated with Royal Society, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Institut d'Histoire des Sciences et Techniques, and the International Union of History and Philosophy of Science. Production involves peer review, copy-editing, and collaboration with printers and distribution partners located in the United States and international academic networks reaching Japan, Germany, France, and United Kingdom institutions.

Influence and Reception

Over a century Isis has shaped historiographical debates involving the interpretation of Thomas Kuhn’s work, the rise of social history linked to scholars at University College London and University of Pittsburgh, and interdisciplinary conversations with departments at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and California Institute of Technology. The journal’s bibliographies and review essays have influenced collections at the Library of Congress and curricular decisions at graduate programs such as those at University of Toronto and University of Chicago. Special issues and articles have provoked responses in venues like the American Historical Review, the British Journal for the History of Science, and the Journal of the History of Ideas, and shaped policy discussions in forums connected to the National Science Foundation and cultural institutions including the National Gallery and Smithsonian Institution.

Notable Articles and Special Issues

Notable pieces have examined the networks of Robert Boyle, epistemologies linked to René Descartes, instrumentation in the work of Antonie van Leeuwenhoek, and mathematical practice associated with Carl Friedrich Gauss. Special issues have focused on topics such as colonial science in the context of British Empire, gender and science addressing figures like Rosalind Franklin and Lise Meitner, and technology histories tied to the Cold War and the Space Race. The journal has published influential historiographical essays engaging with the legacies of Michael Faraday, the institutional history of the Royal Institution, and archival investigations into the papers of Niels Bohr and Werner Heisenberg.

Category:History of science journals Category:Academic journals established in 1913