Welcome

The Centre for History of Science is an interdisciplinary research centre, founded in 2003, exploring the history of knowledge acquisition, circulation and foundation. Research projects span several centuries, regions and cultures, and disciplines and fields, including medicine, technology and the humanities, from medieval natural philosophy to technology transfer and medicine in the 20^th century, and from China to the Low Countries and Congo.

It is made up of senior researchers across departments of the Faculty of Arts and Philosophy and other Faculties, who play key roles in the internationally recognized discipline of the history of science, and junior researchers of the Doctoral School of Arts, Humanities and Law, located at Ghent University. The Centre’s aim is to promote collaboration between researchers by offering a platform for project development, international collaboration and exchange between junior and senior researchers through workshops, seminars and lectures.

The senior members of the Centre support the study of all aspects of the histories of science, education, technology and medicine by serving on the editorial boards of leading international journals devoted to the history of science and the scientific and organizing committees of international collaborative enterprises, such as societies and conferences, and by promoting research projects. The Centre has particular strengths in the following subject areas:

I. Philosophy and the Natural Sciences in their Historical Relation
II. Knowledge Circulation and Transfer
III. Art as Knowledge
IV. University History and Discipline Formation
V. Science and Religion
VI. Argumentation Discourses: The Poesis of Knowledge

The website of the Centre was named after George Sarton (1884-1956), the pioneer in the field of history of science, who started his work, including the publication of Isis, in the city of Ghent. In 1984, at the centenary of Sarton's birthday, Ghent University decided to establish a Sarton Chair of History of Science.