Edmund Russell
· Professor of HistoryCarnegie Mellon University · History
Active 1891–2023
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About
Edmund Russell is a Professor of History and the David M. Roderick Professor of Technology and Social Change at Carnegie Mellon University. His academic interests encompass environmental history, the history of technology, and American history. His major research topics include the environmental and technological history of war, the coevolution of human and non-human populations, and the environmental and technological history of capitalism. Currently, he is writing a history of the U.S. transcontinental telegraph built in 1860-1861. Russell has published numerous articles and books, including 'Greyhound Nation: A Coevolutionary History of England, 1200-1900,' 'Guide to U. S. Environmental Policy,' 'Evolutionary History: Uniting History and Biology to Understand Life on Earth,' and 'War and Nature: Fighting Humans and Insects with Chemicals from World War I to Silent Spring.' He has also published a digital reference work on telegraph history. Russell earned his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in 1993, with a background in biology and English, and joined Carnegie Mellon in 2019, drawn by the university's emphasis on interdisciplinary research and teaching. His research methods often synthesize history with biology, ecology, evolution, and neuroscience.
Research topics
- Computer Science
- Sociology
- Pedagogy
- Engineering
- History
- Artificial Intelligence
- Political Science
- Visual arts
- Art
- Classics
Selected publications
The American Historical Review · 2014-12-01 · 25 citations
article1st authorCorrespondingReflections: Environmental History in the Era of COVID-19
Environmental History · 2020 · 15 citations
Spinning their way into history: Silkworms, mulberries and manufacturing landscapes in China
Global Environment · 2017-03-07 · 3 citations
article1st authorCorrespondingAbstract This paper uses the history of silk manufacturing in China as a case study of the impact of biological processes on manufacturing landscapes. The thesis is that the Chinese silk industry succeeded because people inserted themselves as partners in the coevolution of silkworms and mulberry trees. Becoming a coevolutionary partner enabled people to make silkworms and mulberries into more efficient biotechnologies. Silkworms and mulberry trees evolved traits that benefited themselves. Peopl…
Animating History: Digitally Mapping the United States Telegraph System
Technology and Culture · 2023-10-01 · 2 citations
article1st authorCorrespondingDigital humanities is a booming field. This article introduces a new digital map that shows the development of the telegraph system in the United States from its inception in 1844 to 1862. This interactive map locates offices and lines, and it displays data that put the telegraph system in its political, social, and environmental contexts. As far as the authors know, this is the first born-digital map of a telegraph system anywhere in the world. Readers are invited to explore the freely availabl…
Hands On Ethics: Experiences With Cases In The Classroom
2020 · 2 citations
Senior authorCorrespondingThis paper describes classroom experiences using two ethics cases (A.C. Rich and DesignTex) developed by Michael German and his team.1 Edmund Russell describes why he uses case studies in general and how he has used these two cases in particular.z Julie Stocker describes the way she and others evaluated the cases and the results they obtained.
Frequent coauthors
- 9 shared
Marcus Hall
University of Zurich
- 9 shared
Adam Rome
University at Buffalo, State University of New York
- 9 shared
Ramachandra Guha
- 9 shared
P.J.E.M. van Dam
Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam
- 9 shared
Christine Meisner Rosen
University of California, Berkeley
- 3 shared
Philip J. Pauly
- 2 shared
Susan D. Jones
- 2 shared
Daniel Schneider
Education
- 1993
Ph.D.
University of Michigan
Awards & honors
- Guggenheim Fellow
- Dibner Distinguished Chair in the History of Science and Tec…
- Leopold-Hidy Prize, American Society for Environmental Histo…
- Edelstein Prize, Society for the History of Technology
- State Council of Higher Education for Virginia Outstanding F…
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