Scientific Babel: The Language of Science from the Fall of Latin to the Rise of English

From ancient Roman poetry to attempts to communicate with extra-terrestrials, Professor Gordin traces the history of ‘the set of languages by means of which scientific knowledge has been produced and communicatedâ€. He shows not only the progression from languages as varied as the nationalities of scientists to the present ‘monoglot international community†of scientists communicating in English, but also how the dominance of English was never a foregone conclusion.

Michael Gordin is Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at Princeton University, where he specialises in the history of modern science. He was awarded a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship and is a Guggenheim Fellow. His love of language cannot be matched: a veritable polyglot, he speaks Russian, German, English, Ido, Esperanto and Latin among many other languages. He has published on the history of science, Russian history and the history of nuclear weapons.