Hist of Sci Faculty Turnover Begets New Admin

Some familiar History of Science faculty members will comprise a new trio of department administrators this fall.

Anne Harrington, College professor and professor of the history of science, has been appointed as department chair, a post currently held by Allan M. Brandt.

Harrington, who has taught at Harvard for more than 15 years, said the introduction of large gateway courses are part of the department’s attempt to appeal to undergraduates, whether or not they are future concentrators.

“To become more visible, more user-friendly, become more accessible to a larger number of students, are some of my ambitions [for the department],” she said.

Brandt, who is stepping down after six years as chair, said Harrington was an excellent pick for the position.

“I think everyone in the department is very enthusiastic about Professor Harrington taking the chair, and everybody in the department is really looking forward to working with her,” he said.

With his free time, Brandt said he plans to work on the final stages of his book and take on more teaching responsibilities, including his first freshman seminar next spring.

While Brandt will remain in the department, current Director of Undergraduate Studies Peter Buck will retire this spring. Steven Shapin, who is Ford professor of the history of science, will step into the post.

“I’m going to greatly miss Professor Buck,” Brandt said. “I think the department has a great reputation for mentoring students and Peter Buck really set that as a priority.”

Shapin said he hopes to prompt discussion about improving the undergraduate program and noted the success of his predecessor.

“I’m daunted. It’s a very big job, and it’s been very well done in the past by Peter Buck, so I’m just hoping to do a fraction as well as he’s done,” said Shapin, who has written for The New Yorker and regularly contributes to the London Review of Books.

For the past two fall semesters, Shapin co-taught the History of Science sophomore tutorial with Buck.

“Professor Shapin, who joined our faculty just a few years ago, has been very active in the undergraduate tutorial program,” said Harrington, who added that Shapin emerged as a real leader and was a “natural choice.”

Shapin’s counterpart in the graduate program will be Katharine Park, who will replace current Director of Graduate Studies Mario Biagioli and holds one of the longest professorial titles as Zemurray, Jr. and Doris Zemurray Stone Radcliffe Professor of the History of Science and of Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality.

After teaching at Wellesley College, Park found working with graduate students at Harvard a “new and special” experience.

“Teaching graduate students has been an area that has allowed me to expand as a teacher, and I see this as continuous with that process,” she said of her new post.

Along with familiar faces in new positions, the History of Science department will also welcome Janet Browne from University College London.

Harrington, who helped recruit Browne, described her newly hired colleague as “her generation’s most foremost Darwin scholar.”

“Given the importance of the debates about evolution, evolutionary theory, and the modern biological sciences, this is a great appointment for the department and for the University,” Brandt said.

Browne, whose two-volume biography of Charles Darwin has been assigned as sophomore tutorial reading in the department, was a visiting fellow at Harvard in 1978.

­—Staff writer Lulu Zhou can be reached at luluzhou@fas.harvard.edu.