Introduction: The secret lives of textbooks

Textbooks have a low status in the history of science because they have been seen as mere repositories for scientific knowledge. But historians have recently shown how they play a number of roles that can illuminate different aspects of the history of science, from priority disputes to pedagogical practices. The essays in this Focus section aim to expand our vision of textbooks further by showing how they perform various hybrid functions in scientific development.     

启迪心灵照亮未来——班主任工作个案例谈

班主任不仅是文化传道者、班级的管理者和建设者、班风学风的塑造者,更应成为学生蒙昧心灵的启迪者,健康成长的引路人。激励与宽容在启迪学生心灵的过程中起着非常重要的作用。     

The oil palm in all our lives: how this came about

Over time, the oil palm has become the crop of central importance to both our daily lifestyle and to many of the great industries that man has developed. Remarkably, few recognize the oil palm and its fruit, and even fewer know its history. This article tells the story of the oil palm's rise to prominence from a wild plant of Equatorial Africa to becoming the most valuable plantation economy of the tropical world.     

基于能力的知识工作者职业生涯发展研究

由于能力日益成为知识工作者生存和发展的根本,从能力的角度来研究知识工作者职业生涯的发展异常重要。本文着重研究了在知识工作者职业生涯发展中,不同职业发展阶段和所需能力间的关系,进而给出了相应的提高能力的学习方式,并总结了知识工作者在职业生涯的演进中能力的演变进程。     

Pedagogy and performativity: Rendering laboratory lives in the documentary "Naturally obsessed: the making of a scientist"

A recently released documentary on life in a protein crystallography laboratory offers an exemplary opportunity to examine how a popular account of scientific training models narrowly defined norms of masculinity and mentorship and simultaneously sets these as the tacit conditions for success in science. Rather than treating this documentary as a good or bad representation of what life in the lab is actually like, this analysis draws attention to how the scientists featured in the film perform for the camera and how the filmmakers splice together the action to animate an engaging story. This essay shows how this popular and widely circulating documentary frames science as a game to be won and stages scientific success on an agonistic playing field. Those who can "make it" are those who are tough enough and those who are willing and able to get entangled in the taunting, jesting, and jostling relationships that appear to be required for mentorship in this lab. The essay argues that this documentary tethers this model of success in science to restrictive norms of masculinity and in so doing promotes a pedagogical culture that fosters competition, rivalry, and ritualized shame. Feminist theories of performativity are engaged to consider the iterative processes through which narrowly circumscribed masculinities and styles of pedagogy are sedimented and naturalized. This essay aims to spur renewed attention to the care historians and anthropologists might take to examine the often hidden tropes that are lurking inside the stories about science that we find so salient.