Officers & Council 2011-2014

The Council of the Society for the History of Natural History consists of the Officers and nine Councillors. Officers stand for election at the Annual General Meetings of the Society and Councillors serve terms of three years. Council may also co-opt members of Council to serve.

COUNCIL The President, Officers and:

• Dr Peter Barnard -
• Dr Isabelle Charmantier *
• Dr John Edgington *
• Ms Miranda Lowe *
• Mr Chris Mills o
• Dr Pat Morris -
• Mrs Malgosia Nowak-Kemp (co-opted)
• Ms Elizabeth Platts o
• Ms Elaine Shaughnessy (co-opted)
• Mr Julian Wilson * (vice-president)

     
* Due to retire 2013 AGM

o Due to retire 2014 AGM

-  Due to retire 2015 AGM

Representatives are appointed by Council and are able to attend Council meetings.  Their term of appointment is initially for three years, with an annual review by Council. This can be extended as approved by Council.

See the International Representatives' page for further details.

The administrative business of the Society is the responsibility of the Officers, supported by contributors. These contributors attend Council meetings as guests to consult on issues relevant to their Society activities and receive Council guidance.

See Society Business for further details.

Officer and Council Member Biographies

Dr Isabelle Charmantier
Isabelle studied History in her hometown in Montpellier, France, before coming as an exchange student to the University of Durham to specialise in Medieval History. She has been in England ever since. After finishing her studies, she worked for a children’s editor, and then for Foyles Bookshop for 5 years, before going back to academia to undertake a PhD on a 1660 French manuscript of ornithology. She is now on a postdoctoral position at the University of Exeter, working on Carl Linnaeus’s writing technologies.

Ms Gina Douglas

Gina Douglas has served as Meetings Secretary for the Society for the History of Natural History since 1989. She is also the Honorary Archivist and Fellow of the Linnean Society of London. As Librarian and Archivist of the Linnean Society from 1983-2007, she was closely involved with the creation of the online library catalogue, the Linnaeus Link Project, and the digitization of the Linnaean biological collections, including his correspondence and annotated works. She was also involved in initiating the on-going project to scanning the herbarium and the correspondence of James Edward Smith and make those available online. Since her retirement, she has returned to the Linnean Society on a volunteer basis. She has contributed to numerous scholarly publications on Linnaeus and Smith and is one of the founding members of the European Botanical and Horticultural Libraries' group.

Dr Pat Morris

Pat Morris is a retired Senior Lecturer in Zoology at Royal Holloway, (University of London), with ongoing research and conservation interests in mammals, especially hedgehogs and dormice. He is a former Chairman of the Mammal Society, Council Member of the National Trust and has extensive experience in natural history publishing and broadcasting. A longstanding academic and practical interest in taxidermy has resulted in publication of books and papers on the history of taxidermy, gaining the SHNH Founders Medal in 2012 and Honorary Life Membership of the Guild of Taxidermists.

Ms Elaine Shaughnessy FLS - Coopted member of Council 
Elaine has a long association with SHNH and has served on Council (1994 – 1996, 1996-98 (co-opted), 1999 - 2001, 2008-2012) and acted as Regional Representative's co-ordinator 1994 - 2006). Elaine is responsible for the Society's newsletter and website. Elaine works as an independent marketing and communications consultant.  Previous roles include Director of Marketing & Communications for the Grasslands Trust, Communications Development Manager for the World Land Trust,  Head of Development for the Linnean Society of London, Head of Publishing for IUCN, International Union for the Conservation of Nature, and Executive Editor for Editions Alecto Ltd and Alecto Historical Editions.

Mr Julian Wilson

In 1997, Julian joined the firm of antiquarian booksellers, Maggs Bros. Ltd., where he worked closely with John Collins in the Natural History Dept. for 11 years. During this time he developed a particular fascination with palaeontology, geology and the earth sciences, and was fortunate enough to handle a number of William Smith maps. In 2008, he moved to the auctioneers, Christie's, where his first job was to catalogue the £1.8M Foljambe collection of natural history. Julian continues to be the natural history specialist in the Book Dept. at King Street, and helps co-ordinate specialist natural history sales in Christie's South Kensington salerooms.  He is particularly interested in the relationship between voyages of exploration and the acquisition and scientific description of natural objects.