Professor
Program in History of Science and Technology
PhD, 1972, University of Illinois
Research Interests
My primary teaching and research relationship is with the Program of History of Science and Technology, which teaches undergraduate courses but offers only graduate degrees (www.physics.umn.edu/hsci) . My research is at the interface of science with American culture, particularly the practice of science in those institutions where there was a persistent and evident relationship with the larger society. This includes the demographics of scientific activity, including the participation of women and the impact their participation has had on the practice of science. Other current research interests connect to the ways science has been presented to the public, particularly in the nineteenth century, through scientific organizations, through public museum displays, and through educational programs. My recent work has also explored the changing meaning of scientific literacy, as understood by scientists, educators, and public policy makers. For a detailed cv and curriculum information go to www.geo.umn.edu/scitech.
New book announcement at www.sallygregorykohlstedt.com
Professional Society Memberships
- American Association for the Advancement of Science
- American Historical Association
- Forum on the History of Science in America
- History of Science Society
- International Congress for the History of Science
- Organization of American Historians
- Society for the History of the Earth Sciences
Recent Honors and Awards
- Ada Comstock Outstanding Woman Scholar, 2011
- President's Award for Outstanding University Service, 2004
- Mullen/Spector/Truax Women's Leadership Award, UMN, 2002
- George Taylor Distinguished Service Award, Institute of Technology, 2000
- UMN TEL Award: Outstanding Computer Aided Course Project, 1998
Courses Taught
- 20th Century Science and Technology
- Science in American Culture
- Women, Gender, and Science
- Women in Science: A Historical Perspective
- Seminar: History of Science and Technology in America
Selected Publications (Books and Articles since 2000)
- Teaching Children Science: Hands-On Nature Study in North America, 1890-1930(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010).
- Edited, with Maria Rentetzi, “Gender and Networking in Twentieth-Century Physical Sciences,” special issue of Centaurus 51(2009).
- Co-authored with Michael Sokal and Bruce Lewenstein, The Establishment of Science in America (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1999).
- Edited, Women in Science: An Isis Reader (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999).
- With Donald Opitz, "Re-imag(in)ing Women in Science: Crafting Self-Images and Negotiating Gender in Science," in Changing Images of the Sciences, ed. Ida Stamhuis, Teun Koetsier, Cornelis de Pater and Albert van Helden, (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2002), pp. 205-240.
- "Patterns of Participation: Women in Science and Technology in the Twentieth Century," National Women's Studies Association Journal 16 (Spring 2004): 1-26.
- With Paul Brinkman, "Framing Nature: The Formative Years of American Natural History Museum Development" (California Academy of Sciences, Memoirs, 2004)
- "Masculinity and Animal Display in Nineteenth-Century America," for Figural Vocabularies of Gender in Science, Technology, and Medicine, ed. Bernard Lightman and Ann Shteir (Hanover: New England Press, planned for 2006)
- "Nature not Books: Scientists and the Origins of the Nature Study Movement in the 1890s," Isis (December 2005)
- “Thoughts in Things: Modernity, History, and North American Museums,” Isis 96 (December, 2006): 586-601.
- "'A Better Crop of Boys and Girls: The School Gardening Movement, 1890s to the 1920s,” History of Education Quarterly 48 (February 2008): 58-93.
- "Otis T. Mason's Tour of Europe: Observation and Exchange in Public Museums, 1889," Museum History Journal 2 (2008).
- With Anne Brataas, “Shared and Distinctive Missions: The University of Minnesota and Its Natural History Museum, 1860-1960,” Museum History Journal 4 (2011): 47-72.
- “Place and Museum Space: The Smithsonian Institution and the America West, 1850-1900” in Geographies of Nineteenth-Century Science, ed. by David Livingstone and Charles Withers (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011), pp. 399-437.
- “Through Books to Nature: Texts and Objects in Nature Study Curricula,” in Science, Technology, and Medicine in Print Culture, ed. by Rima Apple, Greg Downey, and Stephen Vaughn (in press, University of Wisconsin Press, anticipated 2012).
Recent Research Support
- NSF, Nature Study in Historical Perspective
- NSF Conference Grant (co-PI), History of Biological Rhythms
- UMN Grant in Aid of Research, Exhibitionism in Natural History Museums
Recent Ph.D. Graduate Students
- Gina Rumore 2009
- Hung Wood Park 2009
- Suzanne Fischer 2009
- Margot Iverson 2007
- Mary Anne Andrei 2007
- Susan Rensing 2006
- Georgina Montgomery 2005
- Paul Brinkman 2005
- Juliet Burba 2005
- Olivia W. Walling 2005
- Donald Opitz 2005
- Karin Matchett 2002
- Juan Ilerbaig 2002
- Mary Thomas 2002
- Michael Reidy 2000
- Mark Largent 2000