Swanner, Leandra A. (Author)
This essay is indebted to Mary Jo Nye’s scholarship spanning the history and philosophy of the modern physical sciences, particularly her efforts to situate scientists within their social, political, and cultural contexts. Beginning in the second half of the twentieth century, members of the Hawai‘i astronomy community found themselves grappling with opposition to new telescope projects stemming from the rise of environmental and indigenous rights movements. I argue that the debate over the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) can best be understood as an exemplar of “neocolonialist science.” For indigenous groups who object to science on sacred lands, science has effectively become an agent of colonization. As the TMT controversy illustrates, practicing neocolonialist science—even unknowingly—comes at a high cost for all parties involved. Although scientists are understandably reluctant to equate their professional activities with cultural annihilation, dismissing this unflattering neocolonialist image of modern science has both ethical and practical consequences: Native communities continue to report feeling victimized while scientists’ efforts to expand their research programs suffer social, legal, and economic setbacks. This essay is part of a special issue entitled THE BONDS OF HISTORY edited by Anita Guerrini.
...MoreArticle Anita Guerrini (2017) Introduction to Special Issue: The Bonds of History. Historical Studies in the Natural Sciences (pp. 263-267).
Thesis
Ashanti Ke Ming Shih;
(2019)
Invasive Ecologies: Science and Settler Colonialism in Twentieth-Century Hawai‘i
(/isis/citation/CBB598061587/)
Book
John Ryan Fischer;
(2017)
Cattle Colonialism: An Environmental History of the Conquest of California and Hawai'i
(/isis/citation/CBB872040578/)
Article
Ashanti Shih;
(2019)
The Most Perfect Natural Laboratory in the World: Making and Knowing Hawaii National Park
(/isis/citation/CBB149416703/)
Book
Moran, Michelle Therese;
(2007)
Colonizing Leprosy: Imperialism and the Politics of Public Health in the United States
(/isis/citation/CBB000830138/)
Book
Seth Archer;
(2018)
Sharks Upon the Land: Colonialism, Indigenous Health, and Culture in Hawai'i, 1778-1855
(/isis/citation/CBB725520854/)
Article
Reetta Humalajoki;
(2020)
Tearing down the ‘buckskin curtain’: Domestic policy-making and Indigenous intellectuals in the Cold War United States and Canada
(/isis/citation/CBB190948130/)
Article
Mascha Gugganig;
(2021)
Hawaiʻi as a Laboratory Paradise: Divergent Sociotechnical Island Imaginaries
(/isis/citation/CBB862166881/)
Chapter
Kim, Jean J.;
(2014)
Professionalizing “Local Girls”: Nursing and U.S. Colonial Rule in Hawai'i, 1920-1948
(/isis/citation/CBB001553450/)
Book
David A. Chang;
(2016)
The World and All the Things upon It: Native Hawaiian Geographies of Exploration
(/isis/citation/CBB167929390/)
Article
Ashanti Shih;
(2023)
Talking Story with the Archives
(/isis/citation/CBB323217003/)
Article
Carlos Viesca Treviño;
Maríablanca Ramos de Viesca;
(2018)
Mexican Medicinal Plants a Therapeutic Resource of Physicians and Traditional Healers
(/isis/citation/CBB305763570/)
Article
Christine Folch;
(2021)
Ceremony, Medicine, Caffeinated Tea: Unearthing the Forgotten Faces of the North American Stimulant Yaupon (Ilex vomitoria)
(/isis/citation/CBB450129077/)
Book
Robins, Nicholas A.;
(2011)
Mercury, Mining, and Empire: The Human and Ecological Cost of Colonial Silver Mining in the Andes
(/isis/citation/CBB001212498/)
Thesis
Manganaro, Christine Leah;
(2012)
Assimilating Hawai'i: Racial Research in a Colonial “Laboratory,” 1919--1939
(/isis/citation/CBB001560762/)
Thesis
Mehra, Akhil;
(2011)
“Shangri-Laboratory”: Place And Psychiatric Public Health in Hawaii, 1939--1963
(/isis/citation/CBB001567317/)
Book
Tiina Äikäs;
Anna-Kaisa Salmi;
(2019)
The Sound of Silence: Indigenous Perspectives on the Historical Archaeology of Colonialism
(/isis/citation/CBB491977264/)
Article
Minakshi Menon;
(2022)
Indigenous knowledges and colonial sciences in South Asia
(/isis/citation/CBB601728541/)
Article
Smithers, Gregory D.;
(2015)
Beyond the “Ecological Indian”: Environmental Politics and Traditional Ecological Knowledge in Modern North America
(/isis/citation/CBB001422283/)
Book
Peter Dowling;
(2021)
Fatal Contact: How Epidemics Nearly Wiped Out Australia’s First Peoples
(/isis/citation/CBB723225615/)
Book
Few, Martha;
Tortorici, Zeb;
(2013)
Centering Animals in Latin American History
(/isis/citation/CBB001422387/)
Be the first to comment!