James J. Bono

PhD

James J. Bono.

James J. Bono

PhD

James J. Bono

PhD

Fields

Early Modern European History; Gender and Sexuality; Intellectual History; Medicine, Disability and Science; Transnational History

Education

  • PhD, Harvard, 1981

Courses Regularly Taught

HIS 357: History of Medicine
HIS 351: The Scientific Revolution
HIS 517: History and Theory
HIS 525: Readings in the Cultural History of Science

Research Interests

My research interests include the cultural history of science and medicine during the Renaissance and early modern periods; the Scientific Revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries (especially the relations among language, religion, society, natural philosophy, medicine, and natural history); images, visualization, and technologies of the “literal” in early modern science; the history of the body and sexuality; the role of metaphor and narrative in science; and the function of technologies of communication in the production and dynamics of knowledge and culture. In addition, I am also interested in medical humanities, literature and medicine, and the narrative construction of illness and the physician-patient relationship.

Current Research

I am working on the following projects:
Figuring Science: Metaphor, Narrative, and the Cultural Location of Scientific Revolutions

"The Word of God and the Languages of Man: Interpreting Nature in Early Modern Science and Medicine. Volume 2, England, 1640-1670.

“Imagining Nature: Technologies of the Literal and the Scientific Revolution.”

Selected Publications

"The Word of God and the Languages of Man: Interpreting Nature in Early Modern Science and Medicine. Vol. 1, Ficino to Descartes." Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1995.

"Does the Body Matter? The University at Buffalo Sesquicentennial Symposium." Special Issue of Configurations 5:2 (Spring 1997). Guest Editor, James J. Bono.

"Ethical Issues in Health Care on the Frontiers of the Twenty-First Century." Ed. Stephen E. Wear, James J. Bono, Gerald Logue, and Adrianne McEvoy. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2000.

"Encyclopedia of the Early Modern World: Europe 1450-1789." Associate Editor for Science, Medicine, and Technology. {Editor-in-chief, Jonathan Dewald.] 6 vols. New York: Scribners, forthcoming [December 2003].

"Medical Spirits and the Medieval Language of Life." Traditio 40 (1984): 91-130.

"Science, Discourse, and Literature: The Role/Rule of Metapho-r in -Science." In: Literature and Science: Theory and Practice. Edited by Stuart Peterfreu-nd. Boston: Northeas-tern University Press, 1990. Pp. 59-89.

"Locating Narratives: Science, Metaphor, Communities, and Epistemic Styles." In: Grenzüberschreitungen in der Wissenschaft: Crossing Boundaries in Science. Ed. by Peter Weingart. Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 1995. Pp. 119-151.

"From Paracelsus to Newton: The Word of God, the Book of Nature, and the Eclipse of the Emblematic World View." In Newton and Religion: Context, Nature, and Influence. Ed. James Force and Richard H. Popkin. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 1999. Pp. 45-76.

“The Human Genome, Difference, and Disease: Nature, Culture, and New Narratives for Medicine’s Future.” In Ethical Issues in Health Care on the Frontiers of the Twenty-First Century. Ed. Stephen E. Wear, James J. Bono, Gerald Logue, and Adrianne McEvoy. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2000. Pp. 113-124.

"A New Ithaca: Toward a Poetics of Science.” 2B: A Journal of Ideas 14 (1999): 63-73.

"Why Metaphor? Toward a Metaphorics of Scientific Practice." In Science Studies: Probing the Dynamics of Scientific Knowledge. Ed. Sabine Maasen and Matthias Winterhager. Bielefeld: Transcript, 2001. Pp. 215-234.

Awards

  • 2003-04: Director, Year-Long Colloquium, “Imagining Nature: Technologies of the Literal and the Scientific Revolution.” The Folger Institute, Washington, D.C.
  • 1999-00: National Science Foundation (NSF) Grant, Science and Technology Studies Program
  • 1997-98: Eccles Fellowship in the Humanities, Tanner Humanities Center, University of Utah
  • 1997-98: Fellowship, Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology, MIT [declined]
  • 1995: Editor, Configurations Named "Best New Journal— Science/Technology/ Medicine" [1994] by the Professional and Scholarly Publishing Division of the Association of American Publishers
  • 1993-95: President, Society for Literature and Science
  • 1992- : Editor, Configurations. Published by The Johns Hopkins University Press.
  • 1990-91: Member, School of Social Sciences, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton

Affiliations and other notes

I’m part of a burgeoning group of faculty and graduate students across CAS departments interested in “Science Studies.” Among affiliated faculty: Jim Swan and Joseph Conte (English); Don Pollock (Anthropology); and Andreas Daum (History).We hope to organize into an academic Center or Program at UB.