Lloyd, Harriet Olivia;
(2019)
Rulers of Opinion: Women at the Royal Institution of Great Britain, 1799-1812.
Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).
Preview |
Text
Harriet Olivia Lloyd_Rulers of Opinion_Edited Version.pdf Download (5MB) | Preview |
Abstract
This thesis examines the role of women at the Royal Institution of Great Britain in its first decade and contributes to the field by writing more women into the history of science. Using the method of prosopography, 844 women have been identified as subscribers to the Royal Institution from its founding on 7 March 1799, until 10 April 1812, the date of the last lecture given by the chemist Humphry Davy (1778- 1829). Evidence suggests that around half of Davy’s audience at the Royal Institution were women from the upper and middle classes. This female audience was gathered by the Royal Institution’s distinguished patronesses, who included Mary Mee, Viscountess Palmerston (1752-1805) and the chemist Elizabeth Anne, Lady Hippisley (1762/3-1843). A further original contribution of this thesis is to explain why women subscribed to the Royal Institution from the audience perspective. First, Linda Colley’s concept of the “service élite” is used to explain why an institution that aimed to apply science to the “common purposes of life” appealed to fashionable women like the distinguished patronesses. These women were “rulers of opinion,” women who could influence their peers and transform the image of a degenerate ruling class to that of an élite that served the nation. Second, Adeline Johns-Putra’s argument that the poet and audience member Eleanor Anne Porden (1795-1825) saw Davy as a “knight of science” is expanded upon to explain Davy’s success at the Royal Institution. In the cult of heroism of the Napoleonic era, Davy and his female audience co-constructed a chivalrous chemistry in the lecture theatre. Chivalry meant deference to rank and sex. Thus Davy and his female audience disassociated chemistry from its late eighteenth-century connections with political radicalism.
| Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
|---|---|
| Qualification: | Ph.D |
| Title: | Rulers of Opinion: Women at the Royal Institution of Great Britain, 1799-1812 |
| Event: | UCL |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | Copyright © The Author 2019. Original content in this thesis is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) Licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Any third-party copyright material present remains the property of its respective owner(s) and is licensed under its existing terms. Access may initially be restricted at the author’s request. Third party copyright material has been removed from ethesis. |
| Keywords: | women in science, women in chemistry |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences > Dept of Science and Technology Studies |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10065237 |
Archive Staff Only
 |
View Item |
