2013 Hagley Fellows Conference
“Ways of Knowing the World: History and the Senses”

On Saturday April 20, 2013, the Hagley Museum and Library hosted, “Ways of Knowing the World: History and the Senses,” a conference sponsored by the Hagley Fellows of the University of Delaware.

The conference brought together a diverse group of scholars and the public to explore the historical and cultural role of sensory perception in the human experience—including those that look beyond the Aristotelian conception of the five senses.

Mark Smith, Carolina Distinguished Professor of History, University of South Carolina, delivered the keynote address. He discussed his new work on sensory history and the American Civil War.

University of Delaware-Hagley Fellows UnConference

On October 5, 2012 the Hagley Graduate Fellows of the History Department at the University of Delaware invited members of the UD graduate student community to join together in an interdisciplinary “unconference” on the role of sensory perception in the human experience.

What is an unconference? The format for this event is an a free-floating, intereactive conversation circle, for the purpose of providing graduate students with intellectual stimulation and scholarly networks across disciplines of the UD campus. There was neither a rigid time frame nor any presenters. Rather, all the participants were expected to bring informal curiosity and an eagerness to explore new perspectives.

Download the flyer here.

2011 Hagley Fellows Conference sponsored by the Hagley Fellows of the University of Delaware

On Saturday April 9, 2011, the Hagley Museum and Library hosted, “Disaster! A Conference on Disasters in History,” a conference sponsored by the Hagley Fellows of the University of Delaware.

The conference brings scholars and the public together to examine disasters of all kinds as a topic of research and as a contested historiographical field. Scholars will demonstrate the ways in which disasters have shaped societies, cultures and environments since 1700. Papers explore how disasters inform the histories of business, technology, consumption, the environment, work, and everyday life.

Michael Adas, Abraham E. Voorhees Professor of History and Board of Governors’ Chair at Rutgers University, delivered the keynote address. A schedule of presenters and additional details are available here.

Click here to download conference brochure