ARVYDAS PACEVIČIUS
Vilnius University, Faculty of Communication (Lithuania)
VINCAS BŪDA
Nature Research Centre, Vilnius (Lithuania)
Autobiography of Mykolas Girdvainis as a Document of Scholarly Communication in Europe at the Turn of the 20th Century
Abstract
A manuscript entitled Autobiography, written by fisheries specialist, ichthyologist and entomologist Mykolas Girdvainis (1841–1924), is used to discuss his research work. Girdvainis’s autobiography is compared with other similar texts, such as those of the Vilnius University professor of pharmacy Johann Friedrich Wolfgang (1775–1859), in the context of ego-documents studies. In this presentation, the most significant routes of his travels in Europe as well as places of study and work will be traced and described. A geographic map of his scientific research activity will be reconstructed, and his innovations and findings as well as research technologies in fisheries science discussed in the context of European science. One of the practical purposes of the current undertaking is to compile a bibliography of Girdvainis’s works that would allow for bibliometrics-based evaluation of his research activity and reasoning.
