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  • General Editors: Charles Rosenberg, University of Pennsylvania, Colin Jones, University of Warwick

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19 results in Cambridge Studies in the History of Medicine

From Medical Chemistry to Biochemistry
  • The Making of a Biomedical Discipline
  • Robert E. Kohler
  • Published online:
    07 October 2011
    Print publication:
    31 May 1982
  • This penetrating case study of institution building and entrepreneurship in science shows how a minor medical speciality evolved into a large and powerful academic discipline. Drawing extensively on little-used archival sources, the author analyses in detail how biomedical science became a central part of medical training and practice. The book shows how biochemistry was defined as a distinct discipline by the programmatic vision of individual biochemists and of patrons and competitors in related disciplines. It shows how discipline builders used research programmes as strategies that they adapted to the opportunities offered by changing educational markets and national medical reform movements in the United States, Britain and Germany. The author argues that the priorities and styles of various departments and schools of biochemistry reflect systematic social relationships between that discipline and biology, chemistry and medicine. Science is shaped by its service roles in particular local contexts: This is the central theme. The author's view of the political economy of modern science will be of interest to historians and social scientists, scientific and medical practitioners, and anyone interested in the ecology of knowledge in scientific institutions and professions.

The Renaissance Notion of Woman
  • A Study in the Fortunes of Scholasticism and Medical Science in European Intellectual Life
  • Ian Maclean
  • Published online:
    01 June 2011
    Print publication:
    07 February 1980
  • This study of the world of scholarship and scholarly texts in the Renaissance, the so-called respublica literaria, affords insights into the intellectual infrastructure and modes of thought of the period by its examination of contemporary attitudes towards women. It addresses the questions: What is the notion of woman to be found in Renaissance texts, and how does it evolve? What is the relationship between the notion of woman and that of sex difference, and how is sex difference related in turn to other differences and to the concept of difference itself? Theology, medicine, ethics, politics, and law are examined in succeeding chapters. The threads of the investigation are then drawn together and Dr Maclean shows how the notion of woman was influenced by both forces of conservatism and forces which fostered change, forces which were to be found both inside the confines of intellectual life and beyond them. The final section offers a context for the understanding of European Renaissance feminism and sketches its connections with social and political evolution, humanist scholarship, religious thought and finally problems of language and expression.

A Social History of Wet Nursing in America
  • From Breast to Bottle
  • Janet Golden
  • Published online:
    06 July 2010
    Print publication:
    23 February 1996
  • A Social History of Wet Nursing in the United States: From Breast to Bottle examines the intersection of medical science, social theory and cultural practices as they shaped relations among wet nurses, physicians and families from the colonial period through the twentieth century. It explores how Americans used wet nursing to solve infant feeding problems, shows why wet nursing became controversial as motherhood slowly became medicalised, and elaborates how the development of scientific infant feeding eliminated wet nursing by the beginning of the twentieth century. Janet Golden's study contributes to our understanding of the cultural authority of medical science, the role of physicians in shaping child rearing practices, the social construction of motherhood, and the profound dilemmas of class and culture that played out in the private space of the nursery.

Charitable Knowledge
  • Hospital Pupils and Practitioners in Eighteenth-Century London
  • Susan C. Lawrence
  • Published online:
    07 May 2010
    Print publication:
    26 April 1996
  • Charitable Knowledge explores the interconnections between medical teaching, medical knowledge, and medical authority in eighteenth-century London. The metropolis lacked a university until the nineteenth century, so the seven major voluntary hospitals - St Bartholomew's, St Thomas's, Guy's, the Westminster, St George's, the Middlesex, and the London - were crucial sites for educating surgeons, surgeon-apothecaries, and visiting physicians. Lawrence explains how charity patients became teaching objects, and how hospitals became medical schools. She demonstrates that hospital practitioners gradually gained authority within an emerging medical community, transforming the old tripartite structure into a loosely unified group of de facto general practitioners dominated by hospital men. As hospital physicians and surgeons became the new elite, they profoundly shaped what counted as 'good' knowledge among medical men, both in the construction of clinical observations and in the proper use of science.

Quality and Quantity
  • The Quest for Biological Regeneration in Twentieth-Century France
  • William H. Schneider
  • Published online:
    10 March 2010
    Print publication:
    30 November 1990
  • This book, first published in 1991, examines in detail how eugenics in early twentieth-century France provided a broad cover for a variety of reform movements that attempted to bring about the biological regeneration of the French population. Like several other societies during this period, France showed a growing interest in natalist, neo-Larmarckian, social hygiene, racist, and other biologically based movements as a response to the perception that French society was in a state of decline and degeneration. William Schneider's study provides a fascinating account of attempts to apply new discoveries in biology and medicine toward the improvement in the inherited biological quality of the population through such measures as birth control, premarital examinations, sterilization, and immigration restriction. It is the first attempt to set forth the major components of French eugenics both for comparison with other countries and to show the interaction of the various movements that comprised it.

Public Health in Papua New Guinea
  • Medical Possibility and Social Constraint, 1884–1984
  • Donald Denoon
  • With Kathleen Dugan, Leslie Marshall
  • Published online:
    11 February 2010
    Print publication:
    18 May 1989
  • This book concerns the development of institutional medicine, medical practice and health care during the initial colonisation and later colonial rule of Papua New Guinea. It discusses the relationship between public health and the medical profession and colonial bureaucracy, and also analyses the profession's social and technical ideas which determined the kinds of health policies and programmes attempted. The first part describes the era of tropical medicine which predominated at the turn of the century and survived until the 1950s. The second part investigates the transformation of tropical medicine by the introduction of new drugs and the curative campaigns of the 1950s and 1960s, and thereafter discusses the emergence of a new medical strategy known as 'primary health care'. This original, comparative study will be of value not only to anthropologists and historians of tropical medicine but also to historians of colonialism and its effects on public health care.

Science and Empire
  • East Coast Fever in Rhodesia and the Transvaal
  • Paul F. Cranefield
  • Published online:
    19 January 2010
    Print publication:
    22 February 1991
  • East Coast fever is a lethal disease of cattle, caused by a parasite that multiplies within T-lymphocytes, causing them to become lymphoblasts that behave like cells in leukaemia and lymphoma. This is the story of the disease and its effects on farmers, as well as of the scientists who studied it. The disease was unknown to western science or to veterinary practice until it was introduced into Rhodesia in 1901. It devastated the cattle-raising and ox-cart dependent transport systems of Rhodesia and South Africa and was not fully brought under control for some 50 years. The book describes the social and economic impact of the outbreak, the scientific investigations into it, and the effort to control it. The scientific study of the disease was done in part by the famous bacteriologist Robert Koch, whose many early errors had a negative effect on later investigators whose work was far more sound.

Legal Medicine in History
  • Edited by Michael Clark, Catherine Crawford
  • Published online:
    08 January 2010
    Print publication:
    09 June 1994
  • This collection of essays presents fresh interpretations of the growth of medico-legal ideas, institutions and practices in Britain, Europe and America over the past four hundred years. Based on a wealth of new research, it brings the historical study of legal medicine firmly into the realm of social history. Case studies of infanticide, abortion, coroners' inquests and criminal insanity show that legal medicine has often been the focus of social change and political controversy. The contributors also emphasise the formative influence of legal systems on medico-legal knowledge and practice. Legal Medicine in History enlarges our understanding of the public role of medicine in modern western societies, while opening up new perspectives on social, cultural and political history.

The Colonial Disease
  • A Social History of Sleeping Sickness in Northern Zaire, 1900–1940
  • Maryinez Lyons
  • Published online:
    06 January 2010
    Print publication:
    28 February 1992
  • The Belgians commonly referred to their colonisation of the Congo as a 'civilising mission', and many regarded the introduction of western bio-medicine as a central feature of their 'gift' to Africans. By 1930, however, it was clear that some features of their 'civilising mission' were in fact closely connected to the poor health of many of the Congolese. The Europeans had indeed brought scientific enquiry and western bio-medicine; but they had also introduced a harsh, repressive political system which, coupled with a ruthlessly exploitative economic system, led to the introduction of new diseases while already-existing diseases were exacerbated and spread. Tropical, or 'colonial', medicine was a new field at the turn of the century, linked closely both to European expansionism and human trypanosomiasis, or sleeping sickness. In 1901 a devastating epidemic had erupted in Uganda, killing well over 250,000 people.

Sir Arthur Newsholme and State Medicine, 1885–1935
  • John M. Eyler
  • Published online:
    04 December 2009
    Print publication:
    13 February 1997
  • The half century between 1885 and 1935 witnessed an unprecedented expansion of preventive and therapeutic services offered by the state through its local authorities. Behind the expansion in public services were also profound changes in attitudes toward poverty and dependency and toward the political and cultural significance of health; changes in social policy and administration; and changes in the understanding of the causes of disease. This book examines this time of change through the ideas and experiences of one prominent participant, Sir Arthur Newsholme. Professor Eyler draws particular attention to Newsholme's role in constructing a highly successful local health programme; his tenure as the Medical Officer of the Local Government Board in Whitehall where he launched some of its boldest programmes including national health insurance; his post-retirement studies of international health systems; and his statistical and epidemiological studies and their connection to his policy recommendations.

International Health Organisations and Movements, 1918–1939
  • Paul Weindling
  • Published online:
    05 November 2009
    Print publication:
    20 July 1995
  • This is a collection of original studies on the new international health and welfare organisations between the First and the Second World Wars. The diversity of such organisations and their many-sided activities make this a rich and complex area of historical investigation which has direct relevance to current issues in international health. Multilateral organisations such as the League of Nations and a variety of types of non-governmental organisations are discussed. The role of scientific and professional factors, as well as the priorities of women's employment, eugenics and pronatalism are also considered. Together, the various chapters present a cohesive and integrated view of a hitherto neglected area of study. The book also complements comparative studies of welfare states by emphasising the importance of international interactions between expert groups in a broader political and social context.

Abortion, Doctors and the Law
  • Some Aspects of the Legal Regulation of Abortion in England from 1803 to 1982
  • John Keown
  • Published online:
    26 October 2009
    Print publication:
    20 October 1988
  • Ranging from the beginning of the nineteenth century to the 1980s, this book focuses on the evolution of the law and medical practice of abortion in England. Little academic attention has hitherto been given to the development and scope of abortion law in England, the formative influence of the medical profession, and the impact of the law on medical practice. Consequently, Dr Keown considers the performance of abortion by doctors, and the influence the medical profession had on the restriction of the law in the nineteenth century and on its relaxation in the twentieth. The book does not deal directly with the legal status of the unborn child, the rights and duties of its parents and of the doctors involved in the provision of abortion or the question of the desirability of reform. Rather, adopting a socio-legal perspective, it considers what the scope of the prohibition of abortion has been and focuses on aspects of professional influence on the evolution of that prohibition, and of professional practice thereunder.

Patients and Practitioners
  • Lay Perceptions of Medicine in Pre-industrial Society
  • Edited by Roy Porter
  • Published online:
    19 October 2009
    Print publication:
    09 January 1986
  • The essays in this volume provide an unusual historical perspective on the experience of illness: they try to reconstruct what being ill (from a minor ailment to fatal sickness) was like in pre-industrial society from the point of view of the sufferers themselves. The authors examine the meanings that were attached to sickness; popular medical beliefs and practices; the diffusion of popular medical knowledge; and the relations between patients and their doctors (both professional and 'fringe') seen from the patients' point of view. This is an important work, for illness and death dominated life in earlier societies to an enormous degree. Yet almost no studies of this kind have ever been carried out before, practically all previous treatments having been written from the traditional point of view of the doctor, the hospital, or medical science. It will accordingly interest a wide range of readers interested in social history as well as the history of medicine itself.

Vital Accounts
  • Quantifying Health and Population in Eighteenth-Century England and France
  • Andrea A. Rusnock
  • Published online:
    15 October 2009
    Print publication:
    16 September 2002
  • Why did Europeans begin to count births and deaths? How did they collect the numbers and what did they do with them? Through a compelling comparative analysis, Vital Accounts charts the work of the physicians, clergymen and government officials who crafted the sciences of political and medical arithmetic in England and France during the long eighteenth-century, before the emergence of statistics and regular government censuses. Andrea A. Rusnock presents a social history of quantification that highlights the development of numerical tables, influential and enduring scientific instruments designed to evaluate smallpox inoculation, to link weather and disease to compare infant and maternal mortality rates, to identify changes in disease patterns and to challenge prevailing views about the decline of European population. By focusing on the most important eighteenth century controversies over health and population, Rusnock shows how vital accounts - the numbers of births and deaths - became the measure of public health and welfare.

Traumatic Pasts
  • History, Psychiatry, and Trauma in the Modern Age, 1870–1930
  • Edited by Mark S. Micale, Paul Lerner
  • Published online:
    14 October 2009
    Print publication:
    04 September 2001
  • Traumatic Pasts, originally published in 2001, offers a variety of perspectives on mental trauma in war, medicine, culture and society in modern European and American history. Its primary goals are: to provide a generous sampling of the best of the historical scholarship about trauma; to indicate the empirical, analytical and methodological scope of this work; and to present some of the conceptual and methodological issues inherent in writing about the subject. The book operates on the premise that the historical humanities have something crucially important to say about trauma; its essays may be read, in part, as attempts to introduce a deep historical dimension into ongoing debates and controversies. However, it is important to stress that these essays are not simply addressed the concerns; rather, they reflect a shared conviction that trauma opens up fresh perspectives in the study of social and cultural history.

AIDS and Contemporary History
  • Edited by Virginia Berridge, Philip Strong
  • Published online:
    14 October 2009
    Print publication:
    25 March 1993
  • The advent of AIDS has led to a revival of interest in the historical relationship of disease to society. There now exists a new consciousness of AIDS and history, and of AIDS itself as an historic event. This provides the starting-point of this collection of essays. Its twin themes are the 'pre-history' of the impact of AIDS, and its subsequent history. Essays in the section on the 'pre-history' of AIDS analyse the contexts against which AIDS should be measured. The section on AIDS as history presents chapters by historians and policy scientists on such topics as British and US drugs policy, the later years of AIDS policies in the UK and the emergence of AIDS as a political issue in France. A final chapter looks at the archival potential in the AIDS area. As a whole the volume demonstrates the contribution that historians can make in the analysis of near-contemporary events.

The Transformation of German Academic Medicine, 1750–1820
  • Thomas H. Broman
  • Published online:
    30 September 2009
    Print publication:
    28 October 1996
  • By examining German university medicine between 1750 and 1820, this book presents a new interpretation of the emergence of modern medical science. It demonstrates that the development of modern medicine as a profession linking theory and practice did not emerge suddenly from the revolutionary transformation of Europe at the opening of the nineteenth century, as Foucault and others have argued. Instead, Thomas H. Broman points to cultural and institutional changes occurring during the second half of the eighteenth century as reshaping both medical theory and physician's professional identity. Among the most important of these factors was the emergence of a literary public sphere in Germany between 1750 and 1800, a development that exposed medical writing to new discourses such as Jena Romanticism and created the stage on which would be played out the bitter medical controversies of the 1790s.

Morbid Appearances
  • The Anatomy of Pathology in the Early Nineteenth Century
  • Russell Charles Maulitz
  • Published online:
    22 September 2009
    Print publication:
    30 October 1987
  • When we consider how the scientific revolution came to medicine, we often think of the rise of the great laboratory disciplines of the nineteenth century. Often overlooked in these accounts, however, is the role of clinical medicine and its important early branch, pathology. Morbid Appearances traces the emergence in France and England of this important medical tradition. Dr. Maulitz shows how the pathology of tissues came to occupy a central position in the teaching and research of French medical luminaries such as Bichat, Bayle, and Laennec, and he describes how the new pathology helped shore up the fortunes of the Paris medical faculty and the medicine of the 'Paris Hospital'. The author also details the efforts of Thomas Hodgkin, Robert Carswell, and others to import the new science of pathology to Great Britain - and he shows how their efforts to assign a place for pathological anatomy in their own medical culture met with rather mixed success.

Mission and Method
  • The Early Nineteenth-Century French Public Health Movement
  • Ann Elizabeth Fowler La Berge
  • Published online:
    17 September 2009
    Print publication:
    25 September 1992
  • In Mission and Method Ann La Berge shows how the French public health movement developed within the socio-political context of the Bourbon Restoration and July Monarchy, and within the context of competing ideologies of liberalism, conservatism, socialism, and statism. The dialectic between liberalism, whose leading exponent was Villerme, and statism, the approach of Parent-Duchatelet, characterized the movement and was reflected in the tension between liberal and social medicine that permeated nineteenth-century French medical discourse. Professor La Berge also challenges the prevalent notion that the British were the leaders in the nineteenth-century public health movement and set the model for similar movements elsewhere. She argues that an active and influential French public health movement antedated the British and greatly influenced British public health leaders.