Networks of production and circulation of geographical knowledge in Europe between the eighteenth and twentieth centuries. A network for network reconstruction?

Beginning with the works of Charles Whiters and David Livingstone (Livingstone, 2003; Livingstone-Whiters, 2005; Whiters, 2007) to those of a second generation of scholars (Finnegan, 2009), along with theories and historiographic approaches shared with the most general history of science, the international research on the history of geographical thinking has come to affirm an independent sector known as historical geography of science that has renewed the history of science also by the advances of the same geographical research. The application of a geographic-historical perspective to the study of the history of science has led to a broader reflection on the role of the geographical culture, not only due to its academic or school institutionalization but, more broadly, on the role of geography in the constitution of science. In Italy, this theoretical framework has put forward recently studies that were aimed at the reconstruction of networks through which the geographic knowledge between 19th and 20th centuries circulated. These studies started from the analysis of biographical references and works of specific scholars and their main purpose is to unfold the links and networks through which geographic knowledge circulated. It is important to consider that there were local, national, transnational networks of geographers. These networks were also integrated with the contribution of non–geographers and different categories of scholars, independent enthusiasts and pseudo–scientists. These research areas, presented at the conference “La geografia in Italia dall’Unità alla prima guerra mondiale” (Torino 2017), aim to the analysis of how information (artifacts, documents, epistolary correspondences etc.) circulated in those networks. Part of this comprehensive analysis is to understand how these networks through which “geography was communicated” evolved in geographic societies, museums, scientific reviews, reading circles, cultural associations, scientific academies, private cartographic production institutes, Alpine Clubs etc. The aim is also to understand how some research projects and printing initiatives were been articulated, following often a transdisciplinary approach but also an internationalization. The examination of the private archives of some italian geographers – as Cesare Battisti, Cosimo Bertacchi, Guido Cora, Artuto Issel, Gustavo Uzielli –, academic and not academic, aimed initially at the reconstruction of prosopography of scholars. Preliminary conclusions has highlighted in all cases networks of very dense and perhaps partially unexpected relationships. These networks have suggested to us the need to build a research project aimed at investigating the forms and paths taken by the circulation of ideas, between the different places of production of geographical knowledge during 19th and 20th centuries, investigating the role of academies, universities, clubs, geographic societies, associations. Essentially, the goal is to build European research networks to systematically investigate international relations related to the production of knowledge and geographical knowledge. In this perspective, it seems useful to reconstruct the routes and methods of circulation of organizational models in laboratories, libraries, teaching, cartographic production (organization and professionalization of cartographic work), tools and techniques of surveying and drawing. Considering the high mobility and broad interaction of geographers of this period, this study should be addressed specifically through the construction of transnational research groups, aimed at reconstructing the pathways of production and circulation of geographical knowledge across Europe during 19th and 20th centuries.