Overview
Eleanor Webb is a historian of science and education in early modern Europe. Eleanor obtained a BA in History and MA in Culture of the European Renaissance at the University of Warwick (UK), before completing her PhD at the University of Pennsylvania in 2026.
Eleanor's first book project examines how professors and students in Italy used autonomous groups - known as academies - to debate the role of mathematics in the study of nature. As they explored which parts of nature could be effectively studied using mathematical tools, they also grappled over the continued importance of astrology within the university curriculum and in society at large. The study recenters the university as a key site of intellectual change in early modern Europe, showing how controversy surrounding the university mathematics curriculum helped to redraw disciplinary boundaries and to define new criteria for defining legitimate scientific knowledge.
Alongside her research, Eleanor continues to work on several projects in digital humanities and manuscript studies in collaboration with Penn Libraries.