swan_tower: (academia)
swan_tower ([personal profile] swan_tower) wrote2011-04-05 01:29 pm

Natural History research

So, I mentioned before that I have a new series.

It will surprise nobody who's been around for the Onyx Court books that I intend to do a bit of research. :-)

NOT AS MUCH AS BEFORE. (Thank god.) But there are some things I want to read about, to get some good material for compost into my head, so this is the first of a couple of posts asking for recommendations.

The first topic up is, of course, the discipline of natural history. Can anybody recommend a good biography of Darwin, something that focuses on the fieldwork end of things? His education, the voyage of the Beagle, that kind of thing; I'm less concerned with what happened after he published his theories. Or books on other natural historians, or the development of the field. I've got a few things to read already, but knowing the internets, it's entirely possible that somebody reading this post has a random love for the topic of nineteenth-century natural history, and knows exactly what I ought to be reading to understand it. If that's you -- or if it isn't, but you know a couple of things you'd recommend -- speak up in the comments.

If you're not familiar with this topic at all, stay tuned; there will be other requests to come.

[identity profile] cepetit.myopenid.com (from livejournal.com) 2011-04-06 03:35 am (UTC)(link)
Although these are not directly on point for the specific question you asked, I can recommend a couple of blogs that frequently cover issues of this nature (including annual stuff around Darwin Day that might well be directly on point for this particular question) and -- perhaps more importantly -- the social context thereof:

Pharyngula (http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/)
The Panda's Thumb (http://pandasthumb.org/)

Warning for the unaware: These are both pro-atheist (or at least anti-church-entanglement) blogs. I can't imagine that a trained anthropologist would have a problem with that, but others lurking might...

[identity profile] swan-tower.livejournal.com 2011-04-06 09:39 pm (UTC)(link)
I knew about both of those, but hadn't thought of connecting them with this. Thanks!