Sarah Carson

Assistant Professor

Sarah Carson Sarah Carson

Ph.D. Princeton

Sarah Carson, (she/her), is a historian of modern South Asia who studies the intersections of weather and climate, predictive sciences and imperialism. She is currently at work on her first book Weathering Prediction, which identifies the “scientific forecast” as a crucial but controversial modern technology that played a pivotal role in colonial and postcolonial debates about scientific authority and authenticity in South Asia. In the book, she tracks the dynamic interplay between multiple traditions of weather prediction and explanation across the region from the 1860s to the 1960s. Sarah has previously published on the politics of the long-term monsoon forecast and climate history in South Asia. Her related research interests include jyotiṣa śāstra (astral science), Bengali and Rajasthani weather proverbs, global environmental science and climate politics.

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
  • “Anticipating the Monsoon: The Necessity and Impossibility of the Seasonal Weather Forecast for South Asia, 1886-1950,” The British Journal for the History of Science 54, no. 3 (2021): 305-325, https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007087421000194
  • “Atmospheric Happening and Weather Reasoning: Climate History in South Asia,” History Compass 18, no. 12 (2020), https://doi.org/10.1111/hic3.12640