American Curiosity is a lively journey of discovery which traces multiple connections between nature's scientific, medicinal and aesthetic possibilities in the New World and the hub of intellectual life in eighteenth-century London. It is a treasure trove of visual and written sources, referring to Theodor de Bry's iconic etchings of Native Americans; the transatlantic correspondence of Cotton Mather with the Royal Society; Martha Gerrisk's relatively unknown illustration of a Celestial Diagram sent to the Royal Society in 1734; prints from Blake and Hogarth; natural history and travel narratives from well-known observers and intellectuals, including John and William Bartram, Mark Catesby and Thomas Jefferson; and much more besides. By casting her net across the Atlantic and across disciplines, Susan Scott Parrish is able to create a truly interdisciplinary piece of work which, at its heart, interrogates the sources, methods and ideologies of Enlightenment science in the British Atlantic world.

This monograph sets out to negotiate the hierarchy of knowledge construction by emphasizing lateral connections between, on one side of the Atlantic, colonial planters and explorers (including their wives, daughters and sisters), creoles, African slaves and indigenous tribesmen and healers, and, on the other, the learned members of the Royal Society. Parrish argues that these individual collectors, who constitute a varied demographic, challenged assumptions of gender and race within the larger process of verifying and codifying new discoveries. Indeed, a key aspect of Parrish's work, which signals a new direction in the field, is the clear and weighty evidence she provides to support the value and reliability of work undertaken by women, Africans and Indians in the colonies. With the patronage of husbands, fathers and brothers, women were encouraged to develop skills in botany (most commonly) and busied themselves selecting and illustrating new plants for their metropolitan audience. Similarly, African slaves and indigenous populations were relied upon to supply information about herbs and plants for medicinal purposes, or scout out the viability of new territories, information which also made its way to London. Notwithstanding the unease this kind of knowledge and power posed to white male society – and Parrish explores these power relationships fully – the very fact that the empirical “I” of New World discoveries need not be white, male or European, but could be female, African or Indian, and could exist independently (to some extent, at least) in a lateral relationship with London, makes Parrish's contribution a fresh and valuable addition to the field. It is fair to say that the scale and scope of this work, together with its close attention to detail, offer an authoritative study which will appeal to scholars working in a wide range of disciplines, making it a worthy winner of the 2005 Jamestown Prize.