Petter Hellström is a historian of science and intellectual culture, whose work explores the role of images – metaphors, models, diagrams and maps – in shaping authoritative knowledge and naturalising the social world. His most recent project, “Unmapping Africa: Enlightenment Geography and the Making of Blank Spaces”, was funded by Riksbankens Jubileumsfond from 2022 to 2025. A special issue emanating from the project has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Historical Geography.

A graduate of the universities in London and Cambridge, Hellström earned his PhD at Uppsala University in 2019. Before taking up his current position at Dalarna University, he held a series of teaching and research positions, principally at Uppsala University. Outside of Sweden, Hellström has been a visiting researcher at the University of Cambridge, the University of Lucerne, the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, and the Centre Alexandre-Koyré (EHESS/CNRS). He is a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London.

While at SCAS, Hellström will be completing the manuscript of his first monograph, which is under contract with Zone Books. Building on his award-winning dissertation on tree diagrams in the history of science, the book asks why, how and when we came to think of evolution in the shape of a branching tree.

This information is accurate as of the academic year 2026-27.