Call for papers
AAG New Orleans, March 4-8, 2003
From Soul to Psyche - Historical Geographies of Psychology and Space
Co-organised by Elizabeth Gagen (University of Manchester) and Denis Linehan
(National University of Ireland, Cork)
From the end of the nineteenth century, questions traditionally considered the remit of
philosophy, theology, and biology were increasingly absorbed by the emerging field of
psychology. As a modernising discipline, psychological theory re-examined the nature of
the self/subject, the status of knowledge, the dimensions of character and
temperament, the relationship between body and soul, and between evolution and
physiology. Among the various reconfigurations, the shift from soul to psyche fractured
ways of seeing space, place, human causality and behaviour. Philosophical and moral
considerations gave way to a scientific model of psychology, which, in turn, presented
new modes of investigation and new solutions to the problem of human interiority. These
psychological formulations have significant geographical dimensions: planners,
sociologists, criminologists, educationalists, charity workers and clerics employed
psychological and psychoanalytic theories to map, survey, order and transform the
individual in a range of spaces and places. Recent work in historical geography has
considered these contexts, suggesting, among other things, that psychology's
ameliorative and explanatory potential produced a re-mapping of social space,
landscape, subjectivity and physicality. Papers are invited that consider, directly or
indirectly, the contexts of these transformations. To reflect the international circulation of
these ideas, researchers are welcome to address any geographical context.
Potential thematic areas
The geography of psychological theories - their formation, deployment and transfer in
laboratory, clinic or field
Moral geography and psychology
Psychological topography - mapping inner life
Psychological surveys - national, regional and local
The geography of therapeutic spaces
Transformation and re-theorisation of souls
Exteriority and the soul
Physical culture and mental health
Geography of symptoms - mapping psychopathologies
If you are interested in submitting an abstract, please contact either Elizabeth Gagen
([log in to unmask]) or Denis Linehan ([log in to unmask]).
Elizabeth Gagen
School of Geography
Mansfield Cooper Building
University of Manchester
Oxford Road
Manchester M13 9PL
Direct line: 0161 275 3643
Main office: 0161 275 3636/3637
Fax: 0161 275 7878
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