Worlds of Wonder citizen science project
The mid-nineteenth century saw a rising interest in the world of the small. As microscopes became more affordable, microscopists began to establish microscopy societies, and numerous microscopy journals were launched and widely distributed. These journals, inviting their readers to contribute observations, made it possible for geographically dispersed microscopists to work together by sharing texts and illustrations. Often, illustrations and texts would be copied and reprinted, thus targeting several readerships at different places at the same time. For Worlds of Wonder, I asked citizen scientists to help identify and classify the illustrations in microscopy publications, making it possible to trace the routes they took across Europe and America. Ultimately, the Worlds of Wonder project will allow us to better understand the formation of an interdisciplinary scientific community – European and American microscopists – by examining the publications that connected them.
The project is accompanied by a blog and Twitter account, and I gave several academic and public talks to promote the project in 2019. Worlds of Wonder was inspired by Science Gossip of the ConSciCom research group I interned with in 2016.
Other public engagement projects/events
Since 2020, I’ve been running the Historians for Future Twitter account and building a website for Historians for Future.
I am Postgraduate Ambassador of the British Society for the History of Science (BSHS). I was part of the programme committee and tech support team for the 2020 BSHS Global Digital History of Science Festival. In February 2020, I presented at the first BSHS Twitter conference.
In 2016, I participated in an outreach event of the ConSciCom research group I interned with, Science and the Victorian Public: A Magic Lantern Performance, in Leicester.