{"id":3326,"date":"2025-12-30T19:54:24","date_gmt":"2025-12-30T19:54:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/?post_type=podcast&p=3326"},"modified":"2025-12-30T19:54:32","modified_gmt":"2025-12-30T19:54:32","slug":"richard-fallon-contesting-earths-history-in-transatlantic-literary-culture","status":"publish","type":"podcast","link":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/podcast\/richard-fallon-contesting-earths-history-in-transatlantic-literary-culture\/","title":{"rendered":"Richard Fallon – Contesting Earth’s History in Transatlantic Literary Culture"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Richard Fallon, KE Fellow at University of Nottingham and Postdoctoral Researcher in Collections and Culture at the Natural History Museum (UK), discussed his book Contesting Earth\u2019s History in Transatlantic Literary Culture, 1860-1935: Believers and Visionaries on the Borderlines of Geology and Palaeontology<\/a><\/em> (Oxford University Press, 2025) in the Greenhouse environmental humanities book talk series on Monday, 1 September 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the mid-nineteenth century, geologists and palaeontologists had reconstructed an authoritative narrative of Earth\u2019s deep history, from the planet\u2019s molten origins to the rise of humanity. Many figures in transatlantic science across subsequent decades, however, had problems with this narrative: it was too secular, inhuman, and evolutionary, or controlled too exclusively by elite scientists. Speaking from palaeoscience\u2019s unevenly professionalized and controversy-racked borderlines, Christian fundamentalists, charismatic psychics, and respected scholars alike voiced their objections. Until now, no study has brought their work together for detailed comparative analysis. Spanning from the 1860s to the interwar decades, Contesting Earth\u2019s History<\/em> examines the fascinating history of five significant examples of fringe or \u2018borderline\u2019 palaeoscience: old- and young-earth creationism, hollow-earth theory, clairvoyant time travel, and sunken-continent catastrophism. Innovatively combining methods from literature and science studies with the history of science, this book attends not just to the conceptual content of these strange sciences, but also to their proponents\u2019 communication of truth claims through diverse genres ranging from the scientific textbook to the epic poem. Close attention to the hitherto overlooked textual forms and literary strategies of \u2018pseudoscience\u2019 throws into relief competing conceptions of science\u2019s audiences, methods, and forms of evidence. The authors examined in this book attempted to shift the balance of scientific power, creating textual spaces where exclusive hierarchies of expertise could be levelled away. Hijacking geologists\u2019 and palaeontologists\u2019 long-standing efforts at making the prehistoric past visible, these authors encouraged readers to gaze into time\u2019s abyss with bold new eyes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Richard Fallon, KE Fellow at University of Nottingham and Postdoctoral Researcher in Collections and Culture at the Natural History Museum (UK), discussed his book Contesting Earth\u2019s History in Transatlantic Literary Culture, 1860-1935: Believers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"episode_type":"audio","audio_file":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/2025-09-01-Fallon.mp3","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/2025-09-01-Fallon_pod.jpeg","cover_image_id":"3301","duration":"00:55:52","filesize":"43.68M","filesize_raw":"45800771","date_recorded":"2025-09-01","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"13","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"6","itunes_episode_type":"full"},"tags":[17,18],"series":[16],"class_list":["post-3326","podcast","type-podcast","status-publish","hentry","tag-books","tag-environment","series-greenhouse-environmental-humanities-book-talks"],"episode_featured_image":false,"episode_player_image":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/2025-09-01-Fallon_pod.jpeg","download_link":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/podcast-download\/3326\/richard-fallon-contesting-earths-history-in-transatlantic-literary-culture","player_link":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/podcast-player\/3326\/richard-fallon-contesting-earths-history-in-transatlantic-literary-culture","audio_player":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/podcast-player\/3326\/richard-fallon-contesting-earths-history-in-transatlantic-literary-culture<\/a>","episode_data":{"playerMode":"dark","subscribeUrls":{"apple_podcasts":{"key":"apple_podcasts","url":"https:\/\/podcasts.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/greenhouse-environmental-humanities-book-talks\/id1664960759","label":"Apple Podcasts","class":"apple_podcasts","icon":"apple-podcasts.png"},"google_podcasts":{"key":"google_podcasts","url":"","label":"Google Podcasts","class":"google_podcasts","icon":"google-podcasts.png"},"rss":{"key":"rss","url":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/feed\/podcast\/greenhouse-environmental-humanities-book-talks\/","label":"RSS","class":"rss","icon":"rss.png"},"spotify":{"key":"spotify","url":"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/show\/0TNTSCl3zRBues4Eqjkwwm","label":"Spotify","class":"spotify","icon":"spotify.png"}},"rssFeedUrl":"https:\/\/newnatures.org\/greenhouse\/feed\/podcast\/greenhouse-environmental-humanities-book-talks","embedCode":"

Richard Fallon – Contesting Earth’s History in Transatlantic Literary Culture<\/a><\/blockquote>