William Coleman (historian)

William Coleman (1934–1988) was an American distinguished historian of science with a core interest in the history of zoology and evolutionary theory. Coleman also studied the relationship between science and social and political schools of theory. The William Coleman Dissertation Fellowship of the University of Wisconsin–Madison is named in his honor.

Career

Coleman was a distinguished professor in his field. During the course of his career he taught at Johns Hopkins University (1961–1978) and achieved the title of Professor of History of Science and Humanistic Studies. In 1971, Coleman received a fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies and spent a year at the Institute for Research in the Humanities at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Although he returned to Johns Hopkins University when this fellowship ended, Coleman was awarded a second fellowship in 1977 from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and again returned to the Institute for Research in the Humanities at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. In the culmination of his career, Coleman left Johns Hopkins University and began teaching at the University of Wisconsin–Madison (1978–1988). In 1978, the University of Wisconsin–Madison appointed Coleman the title Professor of the History of Science and History of Medicine, and in 1984, Coleman received the honor of being named the Carol Dickson Bascom Professor in the Humanities. Professor Coleman served as president of the History of Science Society in 1987, a term cut short by illness, and was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1988.

William Coleman Dissertation Fellowship

William Coleman died 28 April 1988 of leukemia. In honor of his memory, his widow, Louise S. Coleman, established the William Coleman Dissertation Fellowship in the History of Science at the Institute for Research in the Humanities at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. The Coleman Dissertation Fellowship provides a one-semester stipend, assessed at $13,000 for 2024, a tuition waiver and health benefits, and additional printing, fax and photocopying privileges.

Publications

• George Cuvier, Zoologist. A Study in the History of Evolutionary Theory (1964) ISBN 978-0674349766
• "Science and Symbol in the Turner Frontier Hypothesis." (1966). The American Historical Review. 72 (1): 22-49 doi:10.2307/1848169 JSTOR 1848169

• Biology in the Nineteenth Century: Problems of Form, Function and Transformation (1971) ISBN 978-0521292931
• Death is a Social Disease: Public Health and Political Economy in Early Industrial France (1982) ISBN 978-0299089504
• Yellow Fever in the North: The Methods of Early Epidemiology (1987) ISBN 978-0299111106