Science in the Public Sphere ─ A History of Lay Knowledge and Expertise

Science in the Public Sphere presents a broad yet detailed picture of the history of science popularization from the Renaissance to the twenty-first century. Global in focus, it provides an original theoretical framework for analysing the political load of science as an instrument of cultural hegemony and giving a voice to expert and lay protagonists throughout history.

Organised into a series of thematic chapters spanning diverse periods and places, this book covers subjects such as the representations of science in print, the media, classrooms and museums, orthodox and heterodox practices, the intersection of the history of science with the history of technology, and the ways in which public opinion and scientific expertise have influenced and shaped one another across the centuries. It concludes by introducing the "participatory turn" of the twenty-first century, a new paradigm of science popularization and a new way of understanding the construction of knowledge.

Highly illustrated throughout and covering the recent historiographical scholarship on the subject, this book is valuable reading for students, historians, science communicators, and all those interested in the history of science and its relationship with the public sphere.

Agusti Nieto-Galan is a professor of History of Science, and Director of the Centre d’Historia de la Ciencia (CEHIC) at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona (UAB). He has written widely on the history of chemistry and natural dyestuffs, and on the history of science popularization (eighteenth to twentieth centuries). His publications includeBarcelona: An urban history of science and modernity: 1888-1929 (co-editor, 2015) andPopularizing Science and Technology in the European Periphery, 1800-2000 (co-editor, 2009).