Oct
1
3:00 PM15:00

Fellowship at the International Center for Jefferson Studies

I am excited to announce a new fellowship that has been awarded to me by the Robert H. Smith International Center for Jefferson Studies:

https://www.monticello.org/research-education/for-scholars/international-center-for-jefferson-studies/

This fellowship will allow me to carry out specific research for my book project on:

Jefferson, Territorial Expansion, and the Pursuit of Science in the American Southwest (1776-1826)

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Oct
6
5:00 PM17:00

DISTANT EXPLORER: ALEXANDER VON HUMBOLDT AND CALIFORNIA

BFREE STUDIO

7857 Girard Ave, La Jolla, CA 92037

Please RSVP here:

https://www.bfreestudio.net/events/86/

The Prussian explorer Alexander von Humboldt is prominently featured across the California landscape: Humboldt Bay, Humboldt County. Humboldt Redwoods State Park, and elsewhere. Yet despite his desire to do so. Humboldt never visited California or the region now known as the American West. Nonetheless. California attracted Humboldt's attention as the northern edge of the Spanish Empire and as the western border of the nascent American empire in the nineteenth century. His fascination with the region and his scientific significance help to explain all these cartographic references.

Dr. Sandra Rebok will offer scholarly perspective on Humboldt's abiding and long-term interest in California, as well as California's interest in the famous Prussian.

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New Publikation!
Jun
28
10:30 AM10:30

New Publikation!

Under the title The influence and legacy of Alexander von Humboldt in the Americas new contributions to Humboldtian scholarship have just been published.

Rebok, S., “Humboldt as Intelligence Agent? Circulating scientific Knowledge, and Strategic secrets, in Washington”, The influence and legacy of Alexander von Humboldt in the Americas, edited by Maria Fernanda Valencia Suarez and Carolina Depetris. (Mérida: Mexico CEPHCIS-UNAM, 2022), 33-51.

The entire book is freely accessible:

https://bdviajeros.org/viewlibro.php?dato=150

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Apr
24
4:00 PM16:00

The Life and Legacy of Alexander von Humboldt

Lecture at the German American Heritage Center & Museum in Davenport, Iowa.

Even over two centuries after Alexander von

Humboldt’s celebrated American expedition

(1799-1804), the Prussian naturalist, historian

and humanist is well remembered on both sides

of the Atlantic. While some praise him as the

father of environmentalism, others question his

contribution to the sciences. While some take

him as a colonial explorer, others heroize him

as the ideological leader of the Independence

movement in Spanish America.

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Apr
18
11:00 AM11:00

German naturalists in South America: Alexander von Humboldt, Eduard Otto and Fritz Müller

Conference at the Max Kade Institut Madison:

Nineteenth-Century Echoes:

German Settlers and Explorers in South America

APRIL 18–20, 2022

Pyle Center Auditorium, 702 Langdon Street, Madison

Numerous German naturalists undertook exploration voyages through South America during the 19th century, in different regions and fields of knowledge. While for some of them it was rather a brief visit to a limited area, others decided to stay for many years carrying out their research and collaborating with the local scholarly community. This paper will give a brief overview on the work of those naturalists and then focus on three of them: the Prussian Alexander von Humboldtand his American expedition (1799-1804), the botanist Eduard Otto and his voyage to Cuba, Venezuela and the United States (1848-1841) and the physician Fritz Müller who emigrated in 1852 to the German community of Blumenau, Santa Catarina, and did his fieldwork over four decades mostly in solitude, but in close collaboration through correspondence with the international scholarly community.

 

 

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Humboldt’s Travel between New Spain and the United States
Mar
31
4:00 PM16:00

Humboldt’s Travel between New Spain and the United States




University at North Texas in Dallas, Consulate General of Germany and Consulado General de España in Houston

March 31, 2022 

Zoom Webinar 4:00p.m. ~ 5:00p.m.  (CST)

https://bit.ly/UNTDallasHumboldtsTravelWebinarLink 


 After his 5-year voyage through Spanish America, Alexander von Humboldt arrived in Philadelphia in May 1804 and shortly afterwards met with president Jefferson in the new capital of Washington. The lecture focuses on this important encounter, only shortly after the Louisiana Purchase, when Jefferson was seeking reliable information on the newly acquired land, which formerly had belonged to the Spanish Empire. Humboldt had spent one year in the Spanish viceroyalty of New Spain, an area that today comprises the U.S. Southwest, with access to the most important colonial archives. Jefferson was thus intrigued about this visit and had specific question for the European guest. 

Dr. Rebok will discuss Humboldt´s work on New Spain Tablas geografico-politicas de la Nueva España and shed light on some much-debated questions concerning the information he provided, his motivation and the usefulness of this knowledge for the expanding United States. 

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