Fathoming the Ocean: The Discovery and Exploration of the Deep Sea by Sylvia Ear

Description: Fathoming the Ocean by Sylvia Earle, Helen M. Rozwadowski By the middle of the 19th century, as scientists explored the frontiers of polar regions and the atmosphere, the ocean remained silent and inaccessible. The history of how this changed—of how the depths became a scientific passion and a cultural obsession, an engineering challenge and a political attraction—is the story that unfolds in this book. FORMAT Paperback LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Publisher Description By the middle of the nineteenth century, as scientists explored the frontiers of polar regions and the atmosphere, the ocean remained silent and inaccessible. The history of how this changed-of how the depths became a scientific passion and a cultural obsession, an engineering challenge and a political attraction-is the story that unfolds in Fathoming the Ocean.In a history at once scientific and cultural, Helen Rozwadowski shows us how the Western imagination awoke to the oceans possibilities-in maritime novels, in the popular hobby of marine biology, in the youthful sport of yachting, and in the laying of a trans-Atlantic telegraph cable. The ocean emerged as important new territory, and scientific interests intersected with those of merchant-industrialists and politicians. Rozwadowski documents the popular crazes that coincided with these interests-from childrens sailor suits to the home aquarium and the surge in ocean travel. She describes how, beginning in the 1860s, oceanography moved from yachts onto the decks of oceangoing vessels, and landlubber naturalists found themselves navigating the routines of a working ships physical and social structures. Fathoming the Ocean offers a rare and engaging look into our fascination with the deep sea and into the origins of oceanography-origins still visible in a science that focuses the efforts of physicists, chemists, geologists, biologists, and engineers on the common enterprise of understanding a vast, three-dimensional, alien space. Notes Helen Rozwadowski is one of the rising generation of American historians of science. Her speciality is the development of marine science on both sides of the Atlantic during the 19th and 20th centuries. In Fathoming the Ocean she goes back to the mid-19th century to tell the fascinating story of how sailors and scientists combined to carry out the first explorations of the ocean depths, showing how these actors and events revolutionized understanding of a hirtherto unknown region. In the process, Rozwadowski greatly expands our own understanding, all while telling a story that is original, wide-ranging, and illuminating. I have greatly enjoyed reading this book. -- Margaret Deacon, Southampton Oceanography Centre, author of Science and the Sea: The Origins of Oceanography Historians think of oceans as sites for trade, warfare, or scientific exploration. On the other hand, poets, painters, and novelists have long stressed the oceans exotic beauty, remoteness, and danger. In Fathoming the Ocean Helen Rozwadowski unites these two views, showing that oceans have a history in the broadest cultural sense, one that involves human hopes and needs as well as scientific aspirations and ambitions, and that scientists attempts to fathom the deep originated in wider nineteenth century cultural concerns, what the author calls a cultural redefinition of the sea. This book is required reading for anyone wanting to understand how the oceans have come to play the role that they do in Western knowledge. -- Eric L. Mills, Dalhousie University and author of Biological Oceanography: An Early History, 1870-1960 As the title Fathoming the Ocean suggests, Rozwadowski conceives of the act of measuring the ocean (taking fathoms) as inseparable from the act of imagining it (fathoming). Working from this perspective, she brilliantly places this history of the measurement and imagination of the sea within the context of changing encounters with the ocean as a space of recreation, resources, connections, and personal challenges during the nineteenth century. In short, Rozwadowski uses her history of ocean exploration to produce a comprehensive history of the sea that adds several new dimensions to the literatures on the history of science, the history of the ocean, and the history of social change during the mid-nineteenth century. -- Philip E. Steinberg, Florida State University, author of The Social Construction of the Ocean Most scholars of oceanography begin the story around 1900, but Helen Rozwadowski shows, in this creative and novel interpretation, how marine science arose in the nineteenth century from a new political and cultural fascination with the sea. Yachtsmen, sailors, adventurers, businessmen, fishermen, and whalers all felt the tug of the deep, with its mysteries and myths. By the turn of the century, these diverse interests had come together to form of the basic questions that inspire the ocean science we recognize today. Fathoming the Ocean is a captivating read, brimming with new information and fresh insights into the seas deep cultural meanings. I am convinced Rozwadowskis book will become a must-read for anyone wishing to understand how we have come to view the oceans as we do. -- Keith R. Benson, Green College Author Biography Helen M. Rozwadowski is Assistant Professor of History and Coordinator of Maritime Studies, University of Connecticut at Avery Point. Table of Contents Foreword by Sylvia Earle 1. Fathoming the Fathomless 2. The Undiscovered Country 3. Soundings 4. A Sea Breeze 5. Dredging the Moon 6. Small World 7. Epilogue Notes Acknowledgments Index Review During the 19th century, the ocean became something more than just a body of water to be sailed over and began to be studied for itself. In this study of Americas and Britains growing public and scientific fascination with the ocean depths, Rozwadowski covers the beginnings of bathymetry, dredging, temperature and salinity measurements, current mapping, and the move from yachts to fishing vessels to large ships as scientific platforms. But this is not just an oceanographic history: the author also addresses the social, cultural, and political aspects of this newfound interest--from the development of home aquariums to the laying of the transatlantic cable. -- Margaret Rioux Library Journal 20041215 In this amiable, in-depth examination of the most critical era for the development of modern oceanography, Rozwadowski devotes her attention to the mid-19th century, when British scientists joined a series of nationally sponsored, years-long, worldwide research cruises to explore the ocean deep. Publishers Weekly 20050117 Fathoming the Ocean by Helen Rozwadowski chronicles the birth of deep-sea oceanography, from early observations by Benjamin Franklin to the voyage of HMS Challenger in the 1870s. She weaves a rich narrative from the world of renowned as well as lesser-known oceanographers. While unearthing the foundations of the subject, she reveals some striking parallels with modern research careers. -- Jon Copley Nature 20050519 Fathoming the Ocean will clearly be welcomed as a serious contribution by historians of science, technology, and maritime culture. And in addition, as the foreword by marine biologist Sylvia Earle underscores, the story is also of immediate relevance to anyone who wonders when and how we came to understand--as we now urgently do--the oceans importance to our blue planet. -- Alistair Sponsel Science 20050826 An important academic contribution to the history of one of the most romantic branches of nineteenth-century science and a perceptive commentary on the social and cultural background from which modern observational oceanography sprang. -- Richard Shelton Times Literary Supplement 20050715 Rozwadowskis account of these amateur oceanographers traveling on working vessels is a tremendous piece of historical retrieval, particularly in the way that the endless practical difficulties they faced while dredging for seafloor samples are used to illustrate the social impact a generation of landlubber naturalists had on the professional world of the sea...Oceanography remains a science of measurement and of arguments about measurement, and Rozwadowski is good at reconstructing the technical debates that so occupied its 19th-century founders. -- Richard Hamblyn London Review of Books 20051103 Rozwadowskis wonderfully illustrated volume tackles British and American marine science in the mid-nineteenth century. This is a daunting task given the presence of the Challenger Expedition and the United States Exploring Expedition. Both receive fair and just treatment, but to Rozwadowskis credit, these grand exploring expeditions happen within the context of developments in industry, recreation,transportation, and science itself...Clearly, Rozwadowski is out to detail an important period in the nascent discipline of oceanography...Fathoming the Ocean...will be of interest to historians of biology for a variety of reasons. -- Gary Kroll Journal of the History of Biology Rozwadowski creates informative reading in the years before acoustics, electronics, and other sophisticated materials could answer basic questions such as: "how deep is the ocean?" Most scientists refer to the HMS Challengers global voyage from 1872-1876 as the beginning of modern oceanography. But Rozwadowski gives credit to the early explorers who dropped open-end metal boxes to discover what lay beyond their sight, or mapped out reefs and currents in small sailing ships. Others attempted to determine safe sailing routes and appropriate places to lay transoceanic cables. The book concentrates on the nineteenth century when only 5% of the ocean below a few hundred feet had been explored...Illustrations include dredges, beach combing, yacht sailing, sea animals, deep sea dredging, and early maps made by soundings. The book will satisfy the curiosity of everyone interested in this vast ocean of the world. -- Florence Waszkielewicz-Clowes Polish American Journal 20061001 This book explores the birth of deep-sea oceanography in the nineteenth century, covering the breakthroughs in gathering data and the social impacts. It explains how the presence of researchers on naval vessels led to cultural shifts for scientists, sailors, and Western society. Nature 20080731 Promotional Helen Rozwadowski is one of the rising generation of American historians of science. Her speciality is the development of marine science on both sides of the Atlantic during the 19th and 20th centuries. In Fathoming the Ocean she goes back to the mid-19th century to tell the fascinating story of how sailors and scientists combined to carry out the first explorations of the ocean depths, showing how these actors and events revolutionized understanding of a hirtherto unknown region. In the process, Rozwadowski greatly expands our own understanding, all while telling a story that is original, wide-ranging, and illuminating. I have greatly enjoyed reading this book. -- Margaret Deacon, Southampton Oceanography Centre, author of Science and the Sea: The Origins of Oceanography Historians think of oceans as sites for trade, warfare, or scientific exploration. On the other hand, poets, painters, and novelists have long stressed the oceans exotic beauty, remoteness, and danger. In Fathoming the Ocean Helen Rozwadowski unites these two views, showing that oceans have a history in the broadest cultural sense, one that involves human hopes and needs as well as scientific aspirations and ambitions, and that scientists attempts to fathom the deep originated in wider nineteenth century cultural concerns, what the author calls a cultural redefinition of the sea. This book is required reading for anyone wanting to understand how the oceans have come to play the role that they do in Western knowledge. -- Eric L. Mills, Dalhousie University and author of Biological Oceanography: An Early History, 1870-1960 As the title Fathoming the Ocean suggests, Rozwadowski conceives of the act of measuring the ocean (taking fathoms) as inseparable from the act of imagining it (fathoming). Working from this perspective, she brilliantly places this history of the measurement and imagination of the sea within the context of changing encounters with the ocean as a space of recreation, resources, connections, and personal challenges during the nineteenth century. In short, Rozwadowski uses her history of ocean exploration to produce a comprehensive history of the sea that adds several new dimensions to the literatures on the history of science, the history of the ocean, and the history of social change during the mid-nineteenth century. -- Philip E. Steinberg, Florida State University, author of The Social Construction of the Ocean Most scholars of oceanography begin the story around 1900, but Helen Rozwadowski shows, in this creative and novel interpretation, how marine science arose in the nineteenth century from a new political and cultural fascination with the sea. Yachtsmen, sailors, adventurers, businessmen, fishermen, and whalers all felt the tug of the deep, with its mysteries and myths. By the turn of the century, these diverse interests had come together to form of the basic questions that inspire the ocean science we recognize today. Fathoming the Ocean is a captivating read, brimming with new information and fresh insights into the seas deep cultural meanings. I am convinced Rozwadowskis book will become a must-read for anyone wishing to understand how we have come to view the oceans as we do. -- Keith R. Benson, Green College Long Description This book examines the present crisis of Greecee(tm)s political economy as a crisis of stateness, tackling the domestic as well as the international dimensions. It represents the first attempt by Greek academics to put forward a theoretically-informed, interdisciplinary analysis of Greecee(tm)s fiscal, economic, and political crisis. The approach aims to fill a major gap, combining insights from comparative politics, political economy, international relations theory, and legal-institutional analysis, in a theoretically informed account of the Greek case in comparative and theoretical perspective. The book tackles the issue of the possible next steps for the EU under the influence of the crisis of the eurozone, including a thorough analysis of national sovereignty seen from a domestic and an international point of view, focusing on critical processes in the international arena such as interdependency and dependency, while a legal-institutional chapter demonstrates the erratic way in which Greek government dealt with sovereign debt. The project comes at the right time in order to address a highly contentious chapter in the political development of the Greek state and of the European South. As the crisis in the eurozonee(tm)s weaker periphery unfolds, Lavdas, Litsas, and Skiadas use the Greek crisis in order to address a much larger and critical issue: the role and predicament of stateness in the developing EU. Review Quote nationally sponsored, years-long, worldwide research cruises to explore the ocean deep. Details ISBN0674027566 Short Title FATHOMING THE OCEAN Language English ISBN-10 0674027566 ISBN-13 9780674027565 Media Book Format Paperback DEWEY 551.46 Year 2008 Imprint The Belknap Press Subtitle The Discovery and Exploration of the Deep Sea Place of Publication Cambridge, Mass. Country of Publication United States DOI 10.1604/9780674027565 UK Release Date 2008-03-01 AU Release Date 2008-03-01 NZ Release Date 2008-03-01 US Release Date 2008-03-01 Pages 304 Publisher Harvard University Press Publication Date 2008-03-01 Illustrations 40 halftones Audience Professional & Vocational Author Helen M. 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