Anja-Silvia Goeing

Recent Publications

Goeing, Anja-Silvia. “Conrad Gessner in Verse: Renaissance Natural History and the Swiss Reformation.” jhiblog.org (2022). Publisher's Version Abstract

Although routinely neglected by scholars, ephemeral poetry can teach us much about social networks and networks of knowledge in the early modern period. Sixteenth-century religious reform and the proliferation of scholarship through the new means of the printing press fostered many sorts of communication between scholars from different fields of knowledge. Here, ephemeral literature in particular reveals otherwise unknown connections between religious reform and the development of general knowledge in the sciences. Such was the case with the obituary poem written by the Genevan reformer Theodore Beza (1519–1605) about his former colleague, the physician and polymath Conrad Gessner (1516–1565). As a close study of this poem illustrates, the text is entangled in a complex network of exchange that revolved around the middlemen who helped memorialize Gessner and proved both cross-confessional and stretched across multiple disciplines of knowledge.

Blair, Ann, and Anja-Silvia Goeing. “Manuscripts as Pedagogical Tools in the Philosophy Teaching of Jean-Robert Chouet (1642-1731).” In Teaching Philosophy in Early Modern Europe. Text and Image, ed. by Susanna Berger and Daniel Garber (Archimedes, vol. 61), 165-203. Cham (Switzerland): Springer Nature, 2022. Publisher's Version Abstract

blair-goeing_2022.pdf

This chapter analyzes how the physics courses of Jean-Robert Chouet
(1642–1731) changed across the twenty years of his career as a professor of philosophy,
first at the Academy of Saumur (starting in 1664) then at the Academy of
Geneva (1669–86). We compare eight surviving student manuscripts, noting much
continuity but also some changes in organization, presentation, and content (in particular
a greater attention to the topics of place and extension important to
Cartesianism). Teaching by dictating a coursebook to students allowed the professor
to adjust his course at every iteration. The students also exercised individual choice
in the format, layout, and trappings of their manuscript coursebook, which could
include an alphabetical index or decorative elements. The most famous of Chouet’s
students whose coursebooks survive is Nicolas Fatio de Duillier (1664–1753), who
was later a friend of Newton’s. He studied philosophy with Chouet in 1678–80 and
his coursebook, which unfortunately does not include the section on physics, is
exceptionally beautifully kept and illustrated.

Keywords Student manuscripts · Physics courses · Academy of Geneva ·
Academy of Saumur · Jean-Robert Chouet · Nicolas Fatio de Duillier

Goeing, Anja-Silvia. “Chapter 12: The Genevan Academy: Scrutinizing European Connections in the Time of Theodore Beza.” In Jon Balserak, ed.: A Companion to the Reformation in Geneva, 277-299. Leiden: Brill, 2021. Publisher's Version

goeing-genevanacademy-acceptedversion-2021.pdf

Goeing, Anja-Silvia. “Textbooks of Philosophy in the Renaissance.” In Sgarbi, Marco (ed.): Encyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy. Cham: Springer, 2021. Publisher's Version Abstract

goeing2021_referenceworkentry_textbooksofphilosophyintherena.pdf

The textbook is defined by its use in educational environments: in schools of different levels, in tutorials at home, or in universities. Any change in these environments also had an effect on the educational material employed: the fate of religion, the curriculum of Latin schools, the politics of towns, or the death of one teacher were all important for what was taught and how texts were implemented in class. One of the most significant changes, however, took place outside the confines of the learning environment: the advent of the printing press in the second half of the fifteenth century had a massive influence on the production and use of textbooks in all disciplines. From about 1480, five striking innovations in teaching affected the production and use of philosophical textbooks in academic environments. All of them were supported by the advent of the printing press. First, teachers figured more and more as authors and commentators in their own right. Second, new forms of organization created new formats of textbooks. Third, reference books such as compendia and encyclopedias were not only written for every discipline, but they were also enhanced with illustrations. Fourth, students started to comment on and distribute their teachers' lectures, and some of these editions then featured as the next generation of textbooks. Finally, with mathematics and physics branching out into experimental fields from the second half of the sixteenth century, mathematical and mechanical tools and chemical devices were discussed in lectures, creating new sets of illustrated manuals as textbooks.

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Anja-Silvia Goeing

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Recent Publications