LECTURE

DATE LECTURER2/5/2013 Aaron Pascal Mauck

Colonial Medicine

STRUCTURE OF LECTURE

I. Theories of Disease Causation

II. Disease and Modernity

III. Arranging Colonial Space

Theories of Disease Causation

I. Classical Contagionism

II. Miasma Theory

III. Alternative & Mixed Explanatory Models

Classical Contagionism

επί ="upon or above" δήμος = "people"

Varro & Cicero: Disease possibly Caused by “tiny animals

Some diseases widely considered contagious,e.g. leprosy and plague

Period of contagiousness40 days (classical origin)

Representation of Cholera as Caused by Miasma

Miasma Theory

Classical Origins

Μίασμα = "pollution”

Disease Caused bynoxious emanationsfrom rotting matter

Malaria = “bad air”

Growing Support inEarly 19th century

Alternative and Mixed Models

Rudolph Virchow 1821-1902

William Farr: Zymotic Disease

Rudoph Virchow, Louis-ReneVillerme: Social Medicine &Disease Predisposition

Alternative and Mixed Models

Rudolph Virchow 1821-1902

William Farr: Zymotic Disease

Rudoph Virchow, Louis-ReneVillerme: Social Medicine &Disease Predisposition

WHAT WERE THE STAKES?

Contagion, Miasma, & Predisposition imply very different responses todisease

Disease and Modernity: Assessing causation in the context of social change

I. Cholera

II. Sleeping Sickness

III. Typhus

CholeraThree Pandemics in Nineteenth Century:

1817-1824, 1829-1851, 1852-1860

Explaining Cholera

Rooted in Massive EconomicAnd Demographic Disruption

Global Flows of Goods and People Globalize the Transmission of the Disease:Endemic Disease Pandemic Disease

Social Disruption Due to Warfare

MADRAS FAMINES, 1877

Social Disruption due to

Ecological Catastrophe

CHOLERA VACCINATION OF THIRD GHURKA CORPS, 1893

Explaining Sleeping Sickness

Rooted in Demands of Colonial Expansion and Settlement

Shared Ecology of Humans, Livestock, and Flies

Sleeping Sickness Control and Eradication Efforts Linked to The colonial effort

Aligning interests of tropical Medicine researchers and Colonizers

Medicine as “compensation”

FRENCH AFRICAN COLONIAL MEDICAL SERVICEFIELD TEAM, C. 1905

PATIENTS BROUGHT TO MENGO HOSPTIAL, UGANDA, ON VINE STRETCHERS, C. 1890

MAKESHIFT CLINIC,BIRA, UGANDA, 1899

GRALL HOSPITAL, SAIGON F. 1873 LANESSAN HOSPITAL,HANOI, F. 1893

PRINCIPAL HOSPITAL, DAKAR, F. 1882

AMI POST, C. 1900

JOHANNESBURG GENERAL HOSPITAL BLACK MALE WARD C. 1905

Explaining Typhus

Caused By Everyday Social and Economic Disruptions:Poverty, Labor Flows, Poor and Cramped Living Conditions

Endemic Until ~1870 in Europe, then in decline

Change rooted in Entrenchment of liberalEconomic order

Arranging Colonial Space

I.Sacred and Profane (Durkheim), Purity and Danger (Douglas)

II. Racializing Social Distance

III. Medicalizing Social Distance

SIR ALBERT COOK, TAKING TEA,MENGO HOSPTIAL, UGANDAC. 1890.

JOHANNESBURG GENERAL HOSPITAL OPERATING ROOM, C. 1905

FIRST CLASS OF ‘INDIGENOUS COLONIAL PHYSICIANS’ANTANARIVO MEDICAL SCHOOL, MADAGASCAR, 1903