User:JREverest/sandbox/Approaches to Knowledge/2020-21/Seminar group 5/History

History

The History of Psychology

Origins of the term

Psychology is defined as "the scientific study of the way the human mind works and how it influences behaviour, or the influence of a particular person's character on their behaviour". The word itself is derived from Greek, as it combines the two Greek words psyche, meaning "breath, spirit, soul" and logia, meaning "study of". It was first used in 1520 by Marko Marulić, a Croatian humanist and poet, whose interests stemmed in history and poetry. Although Marulić was the first scholar to utilise the term, two other scholars included the term in their works: Calvinist Johann Thomas Frieg, in 1575, and German scholar, Rudolf Göckel, in 1590, as he titled his tractate, 'Yucologica hoc est de hominis perfectione, anima, ortu'. Although the term was implemented by the three scholars in three different contexts, they all considered the concept of the soul and their lack of substantial knowledge on this particular entity.

Founding of the discipline

The foundation of Wilhelm Wundt’s laboratory for psychological research in 1879 is a marker in establishing Psychology as a discipline. By creating a space where scientific methodology could be applied, and psychological processes observed, Wundt hoped to develop a better understanding of the human mind and consciousness. He is often referred to as the "father of experimental psychology" due to his role in the facilitation of this scientific discipline being recognised as such. Prior to this, the disciplines of psychology and philosophy appeared to be inextricably linked; this was due to the curiosity of Ancient Greek philosophers -as well as members of other cultures- as they questioned the nature of the mind and the self. Between 600 and 300 B.C., Aristotle, Socrates and Plato all contemplated themes which are commonly studied in psychology today, such as rationality, mental illness, motivation, pain and pleasure. Additionally, they considered whether human beings had innate qualities, or were instead a product of their empirical experiences- this question is still discussed in modern psychology, as reflected through the nature versus nurture debate. Although there is a clearer distinction between the two disciplines, it is evident that they share common themes: in Robert M. Farr's book in which he discusses the history of the psychology, in relation to Wundt, it is described as a "hybrid discipline", one which applied methods and concepts were "derived largely from physiology to problems derived largely from philosophy".

The History of Environmental Science

Whereas one may view Environmental Science as a subdiscipline of natural sciences, it is a discipline of its own as it draws on the research of specialists across natural sciences, such as physics, biology and geology, and humanities including economics, law and sociology.

By studying environmental issues and anthropic effects on the environment, this interdisciplinary academic field aims to understand how environmental alteration and human actions are intertwined, but also how to tackle these pressing issues.

The Earth seen from Apollo 17

This discipline arose from natural history and medicine during the Age of Enlightenment following the Scientific Revolution of the 17th century. At the time, this new discipline relied heavily on the Comte de Buffon’s encyclopaedic collection, L’Histoire Naturelle, but also on John Walker’s, a well-known chemist, academic research. Both men collected material on geology and mineralogy to study the phenomenon of volcanos and earthquakes.

However, the missing link between environmental issues and human actions challenges this date. The beginning of environmental science could hence also arguably be marked by the numerical revolution that took place in the 1960s. The increasing public awareness of the need to move towards more sustainable solutions and the need of broadening people’s mindsets by taking an interdisciplinary approach to address growing environmental issues lead officially to the emergence of this discipline. Indeed, pressing issues like pollution, ageing population and natural resources were slowly emerging, growing and required solutions.

Notable literary works also facilitated the emergence of environmental science as a discipline, like Rachel Carson’s environment book Silent Spring, published in 1962. Her work, by highlighting how the use of pesticides poisoned the population and devastated the biosphere, gave more importance to environmental problems. It also underlined the necessity to study the impact of human actions on ecosystems. To this can also be added key environmental catastrophises which became publicly known, including the 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill where 235000 gallons of oil were spilled or nuclear proliferation during the Cold War. These events resulted in a global awareness by the population and helped envisage lasting solutions, which are today part of a new movement also known as sustainable development.

The History of Translation

Derived from the Latin translatio, which means "carrying or bringing across", translation is defined as "the process of translating words or text from one language into another."

The earliest evidence of translation is of the Sumerian poem Gilgamesh into Asian languages during the Mesopotamian era but the Septuagint - the translation of the Bible into Greek - is widely regarded as the first major translation. However, it's likely that translation has been around since the beginning of interactions between early civilisations.

Cicero and Horace(1st century B.C.) arguably came up with the first translation theories regarding metaphrase (word-for-word) and paraphrase (sense-for-sense) translation. But, by defining a discipline through the establishment of an institutional authority regarding said discipline, it can be said that translation became a discipline in the latter half of the 20th century. This period outlined a significant increase in translation research, societies, and journals such as Babel and the Canadian Translators' Journal, both of which were set up in 1955.

Throughout its history, translation has been viewed as an interdiscipline. James S. Holmes’ The Name and Nature of Translation Studies was the first paper to recognise translation as a discipline on its own merits rather than a sub-discipline of comparative literature, history, and language studies, among others. To this day, however, translation still serves a purpose in nearly all other disciplines. For example, although history and literature became disciplines before translation, translated texts were and still are essential to the study of both of them. On the other hand, translation studies have also been influenced by other disciplines. In the 90s, translation studies faced a ‘cultural turn’ in which the cultural context of the source was considered just as much as its linguistics as well as a re-analysis of its role in colonialism in light of developments in post-colonial research.

The History of Sustainable Architecture

Since the beginning of the 21st century, the building sector, which is directly influenced by architecture, has been responsible for the use of more than half of the world's resources. In particular, building structures uses vast amounts of freshwater resources, energy supplies, raw materials, all while generating 40 to 50 percent of the world's landfill deposits, and 20 to 30 percent of greenhouse gases. Beyond just the building process, the sustainability of a structure in use is also an aspect green architecture takes into account. The ecological impact of architecture has been particularly of interest since the 1960s when the general public, and specifically the youth, started becoming more aware and critical of the negative impacts humans are having on the planet.

A few major figures are associated with this first surge of green architecture; architectural critic and social philosopher Lewis Mumford, landscape architect Ian McHarg with his foundational book 'Design With Nature' in 1969, and scientist James Lovelock. McHarg and Lovelock's ideas were later studied by physicist Amory Lovins and his wife Hunter Lovins when they created the Rocky Mountain Institue in 1982. Later, in the 1980s and early 1990s, architect Malcom Wells created the idea of underground, buildings which were integrated to the earth, and used little energy. Although this was not realistically an absolute replacement for concrete structures, it illustrated the principle of green architecture being respectful of the local environment of a building. The study of these various figures uncover an important aspect of green architecture, which is its need for expertise from a range of different disciplines, covering arts, humanities and sciences. Architect William McDonough, with his creation of the Environmental Defense Fund Building in New York City in 1985, established 'ecologically intelligent design' which places particular importance on the collaborative aspect of architecture, where scientists and corporate leaders are essential to an architect's process.

We can also note that many of these first actors in green architecture were inspired by techniques and buildings which had been around for millenium. In the 12th century AD, a Cambodian temple complex by the name of Angkor Wat was created following concepts of sustainability, not only in its building but also in its daily functioning. Other sources of inspiration were the ways of Native Americans, who lived in harmony with nature, and whose architecture reflected that. With the relatively recent surge in urbanisation, and the growth of cities, it has become important to look back on ancient architectural concepts, to incorporate them into ecological design as we know it today.

In 1990, the first building rating system called the Building Research Establishment's Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM) was put in place to assess the environmental footprint of architectural endeavours. In 1994, in the United States, this became subject to official standards with the US Green Building Council formulating the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards. Today, rating methods and standards like LEED are used all over the world.

Sustainable Architecture and Design as a discipline can be traced back to the 1996 release of 'Charter For Architectural Education' by UIA/UNESCO. This charter establishes "an ecologically balanced and sustainable development of the built environment as a goal for architecture education. This had been a response to the 1993 'Declaration of Interdependence for a Sustainable Future' by UIA, which argued that architecture as a discipline had a responsibility to act towards the slowing down of climate change. Therefore, universities have since then gradually adapted their teaching to cover themes of sustainability, and offer interdisciplinary courses such as the Engineering and Architectural Design MEng at the UCL Bartlett, which combines science with architecture.

The History of Modern Geography

In 1887, Halford Mackinder was the first person to introduce the teaching of modern geography as a discipline at university, specifically in the University of Oxford.

Initially, (physical) geography was predominantly focused with the importance of regions and environment, while human geography, which focused of human activity was seen as being too similar to a social science and thus unnecessary to be a sub-discipline of geography. However, the discipline evolved and the study of physical nature also linked with social, economic and political findings in populations to form a new subject matter - human geography.

In the 19h century, geographical determinism – the theory that the physical environment controls and shapes human action, characterised geography. However, in the 1920s, geographical possibilism – the idea that human culture is not completely defined by the limits placed by the environment, emerged and by the 1950s, replaced determinism, which was interpreted as politically racist.

Meanwhile, in the 1930s, there was a crisis of disciplinary definition, due to the extensive subject matter, variety of methods of study and lack of clear identity. Influenced by Alfred Hettner’s idea that the discipline of geography is unified by its method of focusing on spatial relationships, Richard Hartshorne, in his publication ‘The Nature of Geography’ in 1939, encouraged geographers to concentrate on space, geographic features and how human activity impact them, instead of on temporal variation.

Prior to the 1960s, research in the discipline mainly centred around physical geography and regional analysis, and was criticised for being too descriptive, but this was overcome by a quantitative revolution, which encouraged a more statistical and technical methodology to be employed in order to give explanations of why natural events occurred. This proceeded for a decade and in the 1970s, advancements in physical geography led to the development of models to analyse spatial relationships and compare it with census and fieldwork data, during which human geography had a more humanistic and phenomenological focus.

The History of Religious Studies

Religious Studies is concerned with researching and analysing religious beliefs, behaviours, frameworks and institutions.

Max Müller, the arguable founder of the discipline of Religious Studies

There is a complex history to the study of religion which makes it difficult to determine when the discipline started. It is generally accepted that Max Müller founded what he called the 'science of religion' in the late 19th century as he did valuable translation work of religious texts from the East that enabled different religions to be studied effectively by making the texts more accessible. He was also the first Professor of Comparative Philology at Oxford University, and believed comparative religious studies should be considered in the ways in which a science would be. The beginning of a professorship in the subject area indicates that the academic discipline started here.

On the other hand Müller was not the first to compare religions with various scholars doing this in the past including Herodotus (ca. 484 BCE- 425) who noted similarities between the names of figures in Greek and Egyptian religions at the time of the Persian war. As well as this, religion was studied by Islamic scholars in the Middle Ages who focused on Persian, Jewish, Christian and Indian religions. Examples of these scholars include Ibn Hazm who wrote about Christianity in terms of sense perception, mentioning its historical sects.

It is important to note that a discipline is defined as 'a particular area of study, especially a subject of study in a college or university' by the Collins Dictionary. Thus, it is logical to assume that the discipline began with the first professor in the area.

Not only are the roots of the discipline complex, but it could be argued the nature of religious studies is too. There are both masters and professorships in religious studies itself, at an undergraduate level is often studied with other disciplines to supplement. It is almost always found in the department of Theology and Religion (or some variant of this name) such as in Oxford University, Durham University and King's College London. This shows that it is tied inherently to Theology, and is not seen independently. As well as this many of the influential people in the formation of the discipline have been a part of the disciplines such as sociology and anthropology. It seems as though the history of Religious Studies being a discipline formulated and contributed to by multiple other disciplines has reflected in its current state where it rarely stands alone in general study. For instance, Cardiff University offers Religious Studies paired with 12 other disciplines in multidisciplinary degree programmes, many of them including the social sciences that were integral to building the discipline.

History of Architectural Research

Architecture, by definition, is the artistic process of planning, designing, and constructing buildings. It is a complex assemblage of regions and places that have evolved in their way over the years. Architecture, from the Latin word “architectus” ἀρχιτέκτων (architéktōn) is divided into two parts: Archi (the one who leads) and Tecton (the builder).

The origins of architectural theory take their roots in De architectura, the first manuscript on architecture written by the roman architect Vitruvius. Firmitas, Utilitas, Venustas (durability, utility, and beauty) are, according to Vitrivus, the three main objectives to achieve during an architectural work. Architectural research studies a large panel of material and ideological aspects such as design methods, building technologies, labour process, availability of materials, associated creative practices, representation techniques, economic systems, cultural beliefs, social formations, aesthetics values, and everyday lived practices.

The 18^th edition of the English book Sir Banister Fletcher’s Global History of Architecture (1975) provides a global view of architectural history with few non-western contributors. Until 1975 and in Western countries, the study of architecture was mainly conservative through the visual representation of Westerns culture as the recipients of architecture’s long tradition. Today’s perception of architecture is seen as an open networked system recently influenced by globalisation through the rise of "starchitects", international multi-nodal architectural firms, trans-spatial digital methods, and an increased level of mobility of labour among architects. In the 1980s, globalization introduced the term hyper-modernism in architectural research with concepts such as digitalization, urbanization, sustainability, post-structuralist theory, trans-spatial communication systems, and post-colonial theory. These concepts promote a more globally distributed and networked architectural history. The environmental awareness developed among the Anthropocene age leads to recognition of the detrimental impact of humans upon the natural world and brings architecture into a paradigm with new conceptions of architecture. What used to be craft workers, master masons, renaissance artists and entrepreneurs now have become large design teams engaged in research-driven innovation, in large collaboration initiatives.

History of Disciplines – Data science and Human Rights

History

Data science is a rather recent discipline. Combining fieldworks across computer science, mathematics and statistics, it uses artificial intelligence and machine learning in order to expect upcoming behaviours. In 1974, Peter Naur wrote “The science of dealing with data” in Concise Survey of Computer Methods, but the term was first used in 1996 by the International Federation of Classification Societies during a conference on “Data science, classification, and related methods”. In 2001, the publication of “Data science: An Action Plan for Expanding the Technical Areas of the Field of Statistics” by William S. Cleveland defined this "new science", later called by two researchers, Yangyong Zhu and Yun Xiong in “Introduction to Dataology and Data Science” in 2009. Since then, journals have taken hold of the subject, such as the Data Science Journal initiated in April 2002, and the demand for data scientists in business has grown sharply.

Data science first developed in scientific fields, but lately has opened up its field to social sciences, as Human Rights. Following the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizens of 1789 in France, the United Nations published in December 1948 the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. As defined by the UN, Human Rights meet a variety of rights – among others, liberty, freedom of speech and from slavery, right to have access to an education and a job – that all human beings without discriminations share equally.

Pros and Cons of Data science in relation to Human Rights

Nowadays, data science can be used in order to evaluate Human Rights and give them objective accountability, whether they are respected or violated. The Human Rights Data Analysis Group defines itself as “Statisticians for Human Rights” since 10 December 1991. Its objective is to provide accurate information about people living in places without "basic civil liberty". However, with the rise of technology, social networks, the media, and the Internet, it became essential to regulate the use of data science in order to protect their subject privacy. Created in April 2016, the General Data Protection Regulation launched in 2018 is a law applied for EU citizens which assures their data privacy and gives them rights to know how their data is being used, by whom and what for.

Conclusion

Data science can benefit from an interdisciplinary approach, as it was first related to disciplines in science and then applied to disciplines in humanities, such as Law and the Human Rights. We no longer only think about how to create data, but also about the ethical right to manipulate data.

The History of musical sound recording's impact on the music industry

When looking back at the History of music, there is one moment of pivotal influence on the way we listen to music: The invention of the phonautograph in 1857 by Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville, which permitted music to be recorded for the first time in a physical format. It drastically improved the amount of music we could store and listen to and was responsible for new waves of technological improvements to sound recording that defined the way we consume music today.

A phonautograph from 1859

Martinville’s invention changed the entire music industry’s business model: After the phonautograph was successfully introduced commercially by Thomas Edison, the first record labels were created: Columbia Records (1889), The Gramophone Company (1898),  Decca Records (1929). It is also only in the 20th century, that a vast array of new musical genres were created such as Rock and Roll (1950s), Reggae (1960s) and Hip-Hop (1970s). The newfound recording techniques is what enabled those emerging genres to spread to a wider audience and gain popularity rapidly around the world. This would not have been possible the century before. Therefore, the technological improvements of sound recording also facilitated new music genres to be born.

This combination of newfound recording techniques and emergence of new genres proved to be very successful for the music industry, as it witnessed a growth in sales from 2.0$ billion in 1973 to 14.6$ billion in 1999 (U.S. sales).

The introduction of illegal file-sharing services such as Napster is what put a halt to this growth and it decreased until 2015, where U.S. sales were at 6.7$ billion. In recent years, the industry has started recovering through new music streaming services like Spotify, Apple Music and Deezer. In 2019, 56.1% of all music sales came from streaming services (https://www.ifpi.org/our-industry/industry-data/ ) and U.S revenues were back up to 11.1$ billions.

The History of Behavioral Economics: Merging Economics and Psychology

The evolving study of behavioral economics, becomes ever more important in the developing market system of our society and demonstrates, how so many new insights can be gained through the collaborative work of two completely opposing disciplines with the same goal, to understand a humans interaction. One from a human point of view and an opposing sciences point of view. The study of behavioral economics is a domain of applications that lies at the intersection between economics and psychology. It involves adding the insights of Psychology, in the aspects of empirical research on human cognition and emotional biases, to the rational economic models, in order to predict economic decisions made in the market system of our society. In around 1979, the two psychologists Kahneman and Tversky proposed the first considerable idea of behavioral economics. Since the beginning of the latter, many insightful theories have emerged. One main finding was the challenge of the rational choice theory with the prospect theory, for which Kahneman won the the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics, in 2002.

The rational choice theory holds, as one of the pillars of economics, the assumption that humans know exactly what they are looking for and will strive to maximise their utility. The opposite flow of thinking, is discussed by the prospect theory of Kahneman and Tversky. They published the idea of human nature, which led them to the explanation that the decisions made are not always optimal. This came from their investigation about risk taking decisions, by which the outcome explained that different type of problems human nature faces will inevitably lead to different types of decisions made.

Economics and Psychology as disciplines

Economics only exists as the discipline it is, since the late 19th century, when it was renamed. Firstly, economics has different directions, such as the neoclassical view, which sees economics as the creation, consumption and administration of wealth. Thus, a second direction focuses more on the macro aspect of economics (Keynesian economics), therefore, put the main focus onto price and wage rigidity. Psychology, on the other hand, is split into different pillars, however, as a generic guideline, it is concerned with the scientific study of a humans mind and behaviour. It pillars differ in its approaches to the economists approach to the world, as the discipline investigates the fields of biology, sociology and culture through the lens of theoretical and empirical research.

Behavioral Economics: Interdisciplinary Approach

Until this date, both disciplines still exist as an individual approach, but the interdisciplinary approach of behavioral economics has become a significant part of both disciplines and by itself. The debate of economists and psychologists about the beginnings of the developing discipline and the actual area of knowledge (AOK) is still ongoing. However, with Richard Thaler having developed several theories and underlining statements, how both disciplines can provide different approaches to create new and valid insights. Thaler developed the ideas and theories of Kahneman and Tversky, leading up to the foundations of the Endowment effect, which was first used in the sociocultural approach in psychology but is now a permanent segment in economics.

Thaler first gathered facts and evidence against the efficient market theory, and in collaboration with Ernst Fehr, they showed that human behaviour is actually much more thoughtful that homo economics states. The endowment effect, which explains why people place a higher value on a good if they own it than they do if they are considering purchasing it, is fundamental to understand the introduction to the field of behavioral economics. Richard Thaler brought forward one more major important theory. In his research about the nudge theory he argues, that in a free market, we can find any form of nudges, which can alter humans behaviour predictably , without removing any alternative options or changing their economic preferences. Such nudges could be limited information, mental accounting, choice overload or the psychology of price, with the implications of those sub-theories, the foundations of behavioral economics as a discipline were formed and created a base for other social economists to continue the research.

History of Disciplines– History of Art

Although heavily ambiguous, the term “art” may be loosely defined as objects that communicate and symbolize fundamental truths about their creators. History of art as a discipline, thus aims to interpret and analyze such artworks to enhance our understanding of the ethics and social history of all past civilizations.

Chapters of Pliny the Elder’s Natural History (c. AD 77-79) are the earliest surviving evidence of art history. It is believed that he was influenced by the work of Greek sculptor and writer Xenocrates, who supposedly explained artworks through technical criteria (symmetry, rhythm, workmanship, aesthetics). However, it is difficult to justify Xenocrates as the founder of History of Art in a modern sense as he did not recognize subject matter and moral value in his descriptions.

Meanwhile, it is largely accepted that the emergence of History of Art as a discipline is traced to Giorgio Vasari, a Tuscan sculptor and painter. His encyclopaedic book Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors and Architects saw the first attempt at creating a theoretical framework of the development of art. Vasari described how the artistic skills and techniques of the Greeks and Romans were lost during the Dark Ages and progressively rediscovered throughout the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, the period which is now recognized as the Renaissance.

History of Art was one among many disciplines that was reshaped with the coming of the Age of Enlightenment in the 18th century. German art historian and archaeologist Johann Joachim Winckelmann is another prominent figure commonly considered as “the father of art history”. He famously inaugurated the distinction between ancient art periods; later art historians developed on this by making distinctions of style through comparison, eventually forming the “canon" of art history.

In addition, Winckelmann is credited for transforming History of Art into the interdisciplinary academic field it is today: he was the first to tell the tale of art style development in relation to world history by considering how biological, political, social factors and such contributed to the birth and development of artistic styles, as well as to introduce the methodologies of archaeology to the study of art history. Similarly, Hegel brought philosophy into the discipline while Heinrich Wöllflin intertwined art with psychology.

The History of Women's Studies

Women’s Studies is an academic discipline which expands feminist theory and underlines 'women’s contribution to culture and history alongside critical analysis and theorization of the meanings assigned to the category 'woman' in philosophical, literary, socio-cultural and historical thought'.

The creation of Women's Studies as a discipline began in the 1970s, prompted by the worldwide women's liberation movement (WLM). The movement was originally based in the United States but soon became a worldwide social movement. This "second-wave feminism" is a decisive moment in the creation of Women’s Studies; without it, Women’s Studies might not have existed.

Early research in Women's Studies primarily focused on learning more about the neglected history of working-class women, with feminist historians such as Rowbotham uncovering previously hidden accounts of women during the suffrage movement in the UK. However, the publication of British feminist historian Joan Scott's essay, 'Gender: a useful category of analysis', sparked a new development in Women's Studies as a discipline. It moved the subject away from a more simple, historical understanding of 'what women did' and more into an analysis of how gender-defined structures developed during the past and what caused them to develop in this way.

Over the past two decades, Women’s Studies has become an established academic subject, which can be taught through more than 500 programs across many different countries. The first evidence of an established professorship in this field was at Cornell University in 1969 and, a year later, the first Women’s Studies program was established at San Diego State University. There is also the first scholarly journal in interdisciplinary women’s studies, named Feminist Studies, which is the foundation of a formalized group of intellectuals working together in order to develop Women’s Studies’ knowledge. Nowadays, it's clear that Women’s Studies has become a well-established scholastic subject.