Medical Humanities Blog

On Law & Neuroscience

I'm currently in London, contributing to and participating in the Fourteenth University College London Current Legal Issues Colloquium, this one on Law & Neuroscience.  I will be speaking on the power of the visible as it relates to neuroimaging and American legal culture.

Being at UCL is doubly nice, as it gives me excuse to check out the Wellcome Library and the Wellcome Centre, both of which I have been dying to see for some time.

The program for the Colloquium is available here (*PDF), and, as always, I am honored to meet any readers of MH Blog.

On Eugenics and History (II)

I have the privilege of corresponding, from time to time, with historian of eugenics Gie van den Berghe, a professor at the University of Ghent.  I reprint below his comments on my recent post on eugenics and history:

You call Oliver Wendell Holmes' line 'Three generations of imbeciles are enough' "infamous", but that is how we judge it here and now. In fact it was, seen in its time, a courageous and logical standpoint (and of course not only the decision of Holmes but of the almost unanimous Supreme Court). So his/their decision shouldn't, in my opinion, so much be admired ('Holmes was nevertheless ready, willing, and able to utter the infamous line') then understood.

"We have seen more than once that the public welfare may call upon the best citizens for their lives. It would be strange if it could not call upon those who already sap the strength of the State for these lesser sacrifices, often not felt to be such by those concer­ned, in order to prevent our being swamped with incompetence. It is better for all the world, if instead of waiting to execute degenerate offspring for crime, or to let them starve for their imbecility, society can prevent those who are mani­festly unfit from continuing their kind. The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes. Jacobson v. Massachusetts, 197 U.S. 11. Three generations of imbeciles are enough".

 Generally one cites only this part of 'The Supreme Court Opinion in Buck v. Bell' (or some extract of it), but the Opinion continues and ends by the following line:

 "But, it is said, however it might be if this reasoning were applied generally, it fails when it is confined to the small number who are in the institutions named and is not applied to the ultitudes outside. It is the usual last resort of constitutional arguments to point out shortcomings of this sort. But the answer is that the law does all that is needed when it does all that it can, indicates a policy, applies it to all within the lines, and seeks to bring within the lines all similarly situated so far and so fast as its means allow. Of course so far as the operations enable those who otherwise must be kept confined to be returned to the world, and thus open the asylum to others, the equality aimed at will be more nearly reached."

This kind of argumentation had been employed in the 1920s by several eminent American and European men, frequently with a reference to the many thousands young, vigorous men who had died or ho were mutilated during the devastating Great War. In 1920, in Weimar Germany, the reknowned jurist Karl Binding and doctor Alfred Hoch pleaded wit this and other arguments for the 'euthanasia' for so-called lifes unworthy of life (Die Freigabe der Vernichtung lebensunwerten Lebens), and Adolf Hitler did the same in 1924 in the first part of his Mein Kampf.

his is not to claim that Nazism was founded on Darwinism. There is no direct link, but indirectly one can trace a kind of reasoning about asocial, marginal 'elements' in one's community, a community that was seen as of much greater importance than the individual. The people (Volk), the nation, the body of the nation (Volkskörper in German) had to be saved of the contaminated, rotten cells/individuals it contained. This kind of thinking generated in Great-Britain, shortly before Darwin wrote his 'On the origin of species' (1859) - think for instance of Herbert Spencer. And after the publication of Darwins masterpiece, more and more thinkers, such as Francis Galton, adopted it. Now that the motor of evolution, natural selection, was discovered, one was afraid that the biological evolution, this progress of the human species, was countered or even stopped by Civilisation. A civilisation who not only kept in live marginals that Nature normally would have eleminated (poor laws, medicine, hospitals, asiles), but even made possible that these unfit breed and multiply themselves at a faster rate then the fittest specimens of the nation.

Call for Submissions: End of Life Stories

Call for Submissions:
End of Life Stories

Creative Nonfiction is seeking new essays that explore death, dying, and end of life care, for a collection to be published by Southern Methodist University Press. We’re looking for stories that transcend the “I” and find universal meaning in personal experiences. We hope to include stories representing a wide variety of perspectives—from physicians, nurses,hospice workers, social workers, counselors, clergy, funeral directors,family members, and others. We want narratives that capture, illustrate and/or explain the best way to approach the end of life, as well as stories that highlight current features, flaws, and advances in the healthcare system and their impact on professionals, patients, and families.

Essays must be vivid and dramatic; they should combine a strong and compelling narrative with a significant element of research or information. We’re looking for well-written prose, rich with detail and a distinctive voice.

Creative Nonfiction editors will award one $1500 prize for Best Essay, and two $500 prizes for runners-up.

Guidelines: Essays must be: unpublished, 5,000 words or less, postmarked by December 31, 2009, and clearly marked “End of Life” on both the essay and the outside of the envelope. There is a $20 reading fee (or send a reading fee of $25 to include a 4-issue CNF subscription); multiple entries are welcome ($20/essay) as are entries from outside the U.S. (though subscription shipping costs do apply). Please send manuscript,
accompanied by a cover letter with complete contact information, SASE and payment to:

Creative Nonfiction
Attn: End of Life Stories
5501 Walnut Street, Suite 202
Pittsburgh, PA 15232

Please email any questions to
information@creativenonfiction.org.

Social Medicine 4, no. 2 (2009): Interview with Sir Michael Marmot

While readers of MH Blog may be interested in all of the articles printed in the latest Social Medicine, I want to draw y'alls attention in particular to an interview with Sir Michael Marmot, who needs no introduction here.

As with anything written by or even pertaining to Marmot's work, it is highly recommended.

2nd Notice: Call for Papers, Society for the Social History of Medicine

The Society for the Social History of Medicine invites submissions for its 2010 Conference 'Knowledge, Ethics and Representations of Medicine and Health: Historical Perspectives', to be held at Durham and Newcastle (UK), 8-11 July 2010, organised by the Northern Centre for the History of Medicine (NCHM).

Deadline for proposals: 1 November 2009

The organisers welcome proposals for 20-minute papers under the theme 'Knowledge, Ethics and Representations of Medicine and Health:
Historical Perspectives'. We particularly encourage papers addressing questions such as:

* What processes have generated knowledge about the body, illness and
health that has become authoritative in different societies?
* How have claims of medical expertise been justified vis à vis claims
from other domains of social and cultural authority such as religion and law?
* What did it mean for medical practitioners in different cultural and
social contexts to claim to be ethical as well as knowledgeable?
* How did they present themselves to the public?
* What kind of material, visual and textual representations of body,
mind, health and disease have gained 'defining power' exerting influence on medical practice and research until today?

Submissions covering all periods (from Antiquity to the 21st Century) and all regions of the world are welcome.

In addition to individual papers, we seek proposals for panel sessions (with 3 papers), as well as suggestions for suitable chairpersons.

Abstracts of up to 250 words should include the title of the paper, information concerning the research question examined, the sources used and preliminary results. Please also include on the abstract your contact details (name, affiliation, e-mail-address).

All papers are to represent original work not already published.

Please send your proposal by 1 November 2009 to the NCHM (Email:
conference@ nchm.ac.uk). Decisions on papers will be made by January 2010.

Key-note speakers will include: Professor Heinrich von Staden (Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton, USA), Dr Tim Boon (Science Museum, London, UK), and Professor Martha Few (University of Arizona, USA)

Organising Committee: Philip van der Eijk (Newcastle University), Holger Maehle (Durham University), Cathy McClive (Durham University), Diana Paton (Newcastle University), Thomas Rütten (Newcastle University), and Lutz Sauerteig (Durham University)

For more information on the SSHM please see www.sshm.org. For more information on the NCHM, a collaboration of historians of medicine from Durham and Newcastle universities, please see www.nchm.ac.uk.

_________________________
Katherine Smith
Administrator/Outreach Officer

Centre for the History of Medicine and Disease Wolfson Research Institute Durham University Queen's Campus University Boulevard Thornaby Stockton on Tees
TS17 6BH
Tel: + 44 (0)191 3340700
Email: Katherine.Smith@durham.ac.uk

(h/t H-SCI-MED-TECH)

On Eugenics & History (I)

H-Law published a review by Lynne Curry of two recent books on eugenics, including Paul Lombardo's account of Carrie Buck, and her experiences before, during, and after the notorious case of Buck v. Bell. 

Here is an excerpt from the Review:

Eugenicists, many of whom were associated with the Eugenics Record Office in Cold Springs Harbor, New York, exercised a profound and disturbing influence on law and social policy, including drafting a model compulsory sterilization law and then vigorously campaigning to have it replicated in the states.  While much of this material will not be new to historians, Carrie Buck’s story becomes even more compelling steeped in the rich detail that Lombardo provides.  Buck was an extremely poor, barely educated, seventeen-year-old rape victim, who in 1920s Virginia became a pawn of a blatantly self-serving cast of incredibly shady characters.  Mandatory sterilization laws had met with mixed success in state courts, and therefore in Virginia a small circle of eugenicist lawmakers, doctors, and institutional directors conspired to write and enact a statute and then manufacture a test case to gain a judicial stamp of approval for their own project.  Lombardo vividly presents the patently absurd case concocted purporting to show that Buck was both “feeble-minded” herself and the daughter and mother of feeble-minded females, rendering her a genetic threat to the population and a fit subject for the operation. (Her younger sister was also sterilized.)  Buck’s lawyer, himself a major crusader in Virginia’s sterilization campaign, “violated every norm of legal ethics” in deliberately failing his client at each step in the case, leaving Buck quite literally defenseless (p. 155).

I had the opportunity to meet Dr. Lombardo at the AAHM Meeting in April, and it was wonderful to get the chance to chat with him a bit about the history of eugenics.

Dr. Lombardo has compiled a wonderful web site in support of his book and his work, which features a rich digital supplement chock-a-block with downloadable primary sources from the public domain.  I cannot recommend either the book or the website enough.

As notorious as Buck v. Bell is, I think it is actually underemphasized in terms of its importance, mostly because the case aptly demonstrates how powerful was the hold eugenics exercised on American society during the 1920s.  Lombardo's book, which I am currently in the middle of, does an excellent job of separating the scholarly and religious debate over eugenics from the widespread acceptance it enjoyed among wide swaths of the lay public.  This last point is an important methodological aspect of any social history, which both Fairburn and Jenner warn against (presuming that the attitudes, beliefs, and practices of an elite subsume those of various less privileged communities and subgroups).

Having legal training as to Buck v. Bell helps, not so much because the case is difficult to interpret, but more because knowing anything at all about American legal history suggests just how visionary and singular a mind was Oliver Wendell Holmes.  Arguably the most important jurist in that history, and one of the most influential in Anglo-American jurisprudence itself over the last 100 years, Holmes was nevertheless ready, willing, and able to utter the infamous line: Three generations of imbeciles are enough.  This is a critical example of the reach and power of eugenics ideas, and it is absurd, as so many do, to see this history as a curio, an artifact. 

Roughly 90% of pregnant women informed that their fetus has trisomy 21 (Down Syndrome) choose to terminate the pregnancy.  I do not judge this decision, but do want to note that there is no way to interpret this as anything other than an example of the persistence of eugenics tropes.  Disability studies scholars have repeatedly pointed out that prenatal testing itself is founded on eugenics, whether we endorse or reject the practice.

The history of eugenics demonstrates the importance of understanding history dialectically, as events, ideas, and conditions continue to shape the world we inhabit in profound ways.  There are, in my view, fewer short-sighted approaches to the study of history then to perceive it as a linear "that-was-then-this-is-now" phenomenon.  History has much more to offer than that.  Despite the frequency with which people bandy about Santayana's quote, my suspicion is that a much lower percentage of those who quote him approvingly actually understand why it is that history repeats itself.  It does so, in short, because it never really leaves us.

Thoughts?

Bulletin of the History of Medicine 83, no. 2 (Summer 2009)

The latest issue of the Bulletin of the History of Medicine has been released.  You can access the TOC here.  As usual, lots of fascinating material, including the 2007 Fielding Garrison lecture, and articles on epilepsy among slaves in the antebellum South, patient autonomy in the history of surgery, and the history of pharmaceutical promotion in the U.S.

Wellcome Strategic Award for Cambridge History of Medicine

**** Generation to Reproduction ****

** Wellcome Strategic Award for Cambridge History of Medicine **

The University of Cambridge has secured major funding in the history of medicine from the Wellcome Trust. A strategic award of £785,000 for five years from 1 October 2009 will allow a cross-disciplinary group of researchers to take a concerted approach to the history of reproduction. The research will provide fresh perspectives on issues ranging from ancient fertility rites to IVF. A strongly grounded account, building on a lively field of historical investigation, will offer a fresh basis for policy and public debate.

The new grant will dramatically expand activities established in Cambridge over the last five years under a Wellcome enhancement award to the Department of History and Philosophy of Science (HPS).  Historians of medicine and biology in HPS (Nick Hopwood, John Forrester, Lauren Kassell and Jim Secord, with Eleanor Robson as collaborator) will work with colleagues in Classics (Rebecca Flemming), Physiology, Development and Neuroscience (Martin Johnson), King’s College (Peter Jones), Geography (Richard Smith) and History (Simon Szreter). The team, from four of the University’s six schools,
combines expertise in every major historical period and in approaches from quantifying parish records to interviewing scientists. The aim is systematically to reassess the field.

RESEARCH STRANDS
‘Generation to Reproduction’ thematizes gradual, long-term change and the transformations of the modern age. Four complementary research strands will describe and explain continuity and change. ‘Patients and practitioners’ will study medical encounters with people seeking help with reproduction, while ‘Reproducing generations: conception and survival’ will consider how maternal, fetal, infant and childhood health have affected adult health and fertility, and the reproductive impact of sexual behaviour and venereal disease. ‘Representation and communication’ will show how changing understandings of sex, development and evolution were produced, debated and used, and
‘twentieth-century transformations: technologies, experiences and regulation’ will explore the reproductive revolutions that made assisted conception routine.

PARTNERSHIP
The strategic award marks an exciting new stage in the University’s partnership with the medical humanities programme of the Wellcome Trust. The grant will provide PhD studentships, research assistance, research leave and support for events and outreach, including a major exhibition on ‘The Book of Generation’ at the University Library. As
a sign of support from within Cambridge, the Isaac Newton Trust has granted £46,000 in matching funds.

POSITIONS
Three positions--for an events and outreach officer, a two-year research associate in history of reproductive sciences, and a one-year research assistant in modern social and medical history--will be announced soon. Two PhD studentships will be advertised for
application in the coming academic year.

More information: http://www.hps.cam.ac.uk/generation/
Contact: generate@hermes.cam.ac.uk

(h/t H-SCI-MED-TECH)

Call for Papers (Extended Deadline): Spontaneous Generations

*Extended Deadline - Call for Papers - Spontaneous Generations: A Journal for the History and Philosophy of Science - Volume 3: Epistemic Boundaries*

The deadline for submissions for Volume 3 has been extended to *July 10, 2009*. We are accepting submissions of short papers (1000-3000 words) for our focused discussion section on epistemic boundaries as well as longer papers (5000 - 8000 words) on any subject in the history and philosophy of science. If you are interested in reviewing a recent book, published in the last 5 years, please contact our book reviews editor, Isaac Record ( isaac.record@utoronto.ca).

Spontaneous Generations is an open, online, peer-reviewed academic journal published by graduate students at the Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology at the University of Toronto.

In addition to articles for peer review, opinion essays, and book reviews, Spontaneous Generations is seeking contributions to its focused discussion section.  This section consists of short peer-reviewed and invited articles devoted to a particular theme. This year, the theme is *Epistemic
Boundaries.* See below for submission guidelines.

We welcome submissions from scholars in all disciplines, including but not limited to HPS, STS, History, Philosophy, Women's Studies, Sociology, Anthropology, and Religious Studies. Papers from all periods are welcome.

The journal consists of four sections:
1. A focused discussion section (see below for a summary). Recommended length for submissions: 1000-3000 words.
2. A peer-reviewed section of research papers on various topics in the field of HPS. Recommended length for submissions: 5000-8000 words.
3. A book review section for books published in the last 5 years.
Recommended length for submissions: up to 1000 words.
4. An opinions section that may include a commentary on or a response to current concerns, trends, and issues in HPS. Recommended length for
submissions: up to 500 words.

* Epistemic Boundaries*
It is now common in the HPS-STS community to speak of the disunity of science, of the distinct practices and standards of evidence that have emerged in different scientific communities throughout history. Focusing on this disunity, science studies scholars have highlighted numerous types of boundaries demarcating epistemic communities. These boundaries can be disciplinary, material, geographic, social, cultural, chronological and/or institutional. This multiplicity raises a number of interesting questions for our understanding of scientific
knowledge:

- How are epistemic boundaries determined and to what extent do they identify crucial discontinuities? Do different epistemic boundaries always identify different communities?
- Do some boundaries bring together communities that aren't traditionally seen as united? For example, can some boundaries highlight broad, trans-disciplinary shifts in epistemology?
- What role do physical objects play in determining epistemic boundaries?
What kind of ontologies do epistemic boundaries reveal?
- What role do sites and spaces play in shaping epistemic boundaries?
- Are the boundaries between expert communities different in kind from the boundaries between experts and their audiences?
- How is knowledge transferred across different kinds of epistemic boundaries? What happens to knowledge during transfer -- does it change, is knowledge lost or gained? And what exactly is being transferred -- practices, artifacts, theories, models?

We welcome short papers exploring these issues for inclusion in Spontaneous Generations Volume 3. Submissions should be sent no later than 30 May 2009 in order to be included in the November 2009 issue.

For more details, please visit the journal homepage at http://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/SpontaneousGenerations/

Please distribute freely. Apologies for cross-postings.

(h/t H-SCI-MED-TECH)

Call for Applications: History of Science and Women, Gender, & Sexuality

The Department for the History of Science and the Program in Women, Gender and Sexuality [WGS] at Harvard University invite applications and nominations for a tenure-track appointment that will be located half-time in each program.  The appointment is intended to advance research and teaching on questions and themes at the intersection of history of science (including medicine and technology) and historical and contemporary scholarship on women, gender, and sexuality. The area of focus is open, but might include science and technology studies (including biotechnology), modern life science, environmentalism and ecology, non-Western science, medicine, and technology, and science and/health policy.

The successful candidate must show promise of distinguished scholarship, and be able to demonstrate a commitment to excellence in teaching undergraduates interested in both women, gender and sexuality studies and in the history of science.  He or she should also be able to teach and advise at both doctoral and master's levels.

All applicants must hold the doctoral degree by or before the fall semester of 2010.  Harvard University is an equal opportunity, affirmative-action employer and encourages applications from women and/or ethnic minority candidates.

Letters of nomination are welcome.  Letters of application should be accompanied by a current curriculum vitae, no more than two sample publications, and a sample syllabus and/or teaching statement. Materials should be sent in duplicate to: WGS and History of Science Search Committee, c/o Marcus Dahmen, Department of the History of Science,
Science Center 371, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 02138.   Email:
mdahmen@fas.harvard.edu

Deadline for applications is October 15, 2009, and interviews may be scheduled shortly thereafter.

(h/t H-SCI-MED-TECH listserv)