Portuguese Journal of Social Science - Volume 16 Number 1

Abstract

This issue of the Portuguese Journal of Social Science, focusing on the (re)discovery of new approaches in the history of science, aims at contributing to consolidate the history of science in the field of social sciences at an international level. It assumes that the conceptual approaches and the different methods employed in social sciences play a crucial role in the historiographical renewal of the history of science. The dialogue with the theoretical corpus of social sciences has uncovered new fields of study and new ways of approaching traditional questions in the history of science. In particular, this issue encourages historians to conceive science in motion, paying particular attention to the ways in which scientific knowledge and practices crossed continents, changed, and adapted to different environments. It focuses therefore on the circulation of knowledge, people, ideas and scientific culture in a global context (and particularly between Europe and Americas). In this complex process of change, which occurred in the interstice of states and institutions, a transnational approach emerged as crucial to understand the nature of science in the making.