Prof Aileen Fyfe
Professor of Modern History
- Phone
- +44 (0)1334 46 2996
- akf@st-andrews.ac.uk
- Location
- St Katharine's Lodge
- Office hours
- On leave semester 1 and 2.
Biography
I was born in Glasgow. I studied Natural Sciences at Cambridge, and was awarded MA, MPhil and PhD degrees in the History & Philosophy of Science. I lectured in the Department of History at National University of Ireland, Galway for ten years; and then moved to the School of History at St Andrews in 2011. I was promoted to Professor in 2017.
Research areas
My research focuses upon the history of science and technology, particularly the communication of science, and the technologies which made that possible.
I have recently been investigating the history of academic publishing from the seventeenth century to the present day; this includes the financial models underpinning scientific journals, as well as their editorial and reviewing processes. My book A History of Scientific Journals: publishing at the Royal Society, 1665-2015 (2022, OA) was the result of AHRC-funded research on the world's oldest scientific journal, the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. The expertise gained from that project allows me to offer a historical perspective on contemporary debates about open access, peer review and the future of scholarly communications. Our briefing paper Untangling Academic Publishing: a history of the relationship between commercial interests, academic prestige and the circulation of research (2017) offers a short, non-technical introduction to the key themes.
I am currently using a Leverhulme Major Research Fellowship to work on a history of information, statistics, and publishing in Victorian Britain. Previous works include Steam-Powered Knowledge: William Chambers and the business of publishing, 1820-1860 (2012), which investigated the connections between technology and instructive publishing in the mid-19th-century; I wrote about railways, steamships and steam-powered printing machines in Britain and the USA. I also wrote Science and Salvation: evangelicals and popular science publishing in Victorian Britain (2004) and am co-editor of Science in the Marketplace: nineteenth-century sites and experiences (2007).
I co-direct several projects examining the history of the University of St Andrews: one focuses on the experiences of women in the department(s) of History at St Andrews over the course of the 20th century; another is investigating the links between the University of St Andrews and British colonial and imperial activities in the 18th and 19th centuries.
PhD supervision
- Kathryn Bruce
- Greg Morgan
- Danielle Farrier
- Sudarshana Banerjee
Selected publications
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Open access
A history of scientific journals: publishing at the Royal Society, 1665-2015
Fyfe, A., Moxham, N., McDougall-Waters, J. & Rostvik, C. M., 3 Oct 2022, London: UCL Press. 643 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
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Open access
Untangling academic publishing: a history of the relationship between commercial interests, academic prestige and the circulation of research
Fyfe, A., Coate, K., Curry, S., Lawson, S., Moxham, N. & Rostvik, C. M., 25 May 2017, St Andrews: University of St Andrews. 26 p.Research output: Book/Report › Other report
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Open access
From philanthropy to business: the economics of Royal Society journal publishing in the twentieth century
Fyfe, A., 1 Feb 2024, In: Notes and Records: the Royal Society Journal of the History of Science. 78, 1, 28 p., 20220021.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
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Open access
The Royal Society and the prehistory of peer review, 1665-1965
Moxham, N. & Fyfe, A., Dec 2018, In: The Historical Journal. 61, 4, p. 863-889 863.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
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Special Issue:Editorship and the Editing of Scientific Journals, 1750–1950
Fyfe, A. (Editor) & Gielas, A. M. (Editor), Feb 2020, In: Centaurus. 62, 1Research output: Contribution to journal › Special issue › peer-review
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Open access
Credit, copyright, and the circulation of scientific knowledge: the Royal Society in the long nineteenth century
Fyfe, A., McDougall-Waters, J. & Moxham, N., 1 Dec 2018, In: Victorian Periodicals Review. 51, 4, p. 597-615Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
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How female fellows fared at the Royal Society: Archive study shows that formal inclusion of women does not automatically lead to their full participation, say Aileen Fyfe and Camilla Mørk Røstvik
Fyfe, A. & Rostvik, C. M., 6 Mar 2018, In: Nature. 555, 7695, p. 159-161Research output: Contribution to journal › Comment/debate
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Steam-Powered Knowledge: William Chambers and the business of publishing, 1820-1860
Fyfe, A., 2012, University of Chicago Press. 313 p.Research output: Book/Report › Book
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Science in the Marketplace: Nineteenth-Century Sites and Experiences
Fyfe, A. (Editor) & Lightman, B. (Editor), 2007, University of Chicago Press.Research output: Book/Report › Book
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Science and Salvation: Evangelicals and Popular Science Publishing in Victorian Britain
Fyfe, A., 2004, University of Chicago Press.Research output: Book/Report › Book