Dear colleagues,
*With apologies for cross-posting*
Our fourth seminar in the 2014/15 History of Pre-Modern Medicine series is next Tuesday (25th November) with Dr Irina Metzler (Swansea University).
‘Approaches to intellectual disability in the Middle Ages: Thinking about ‘fools’ and ‘idiots”
Abstract:
Physical disability in the Middle Ages has become a rapidly emerging topic for scholarly engagement in the past decade. However, mental, or intellectual, disability has not been adequately
researched yet. ‘Even the most radical historians have only ever treated “intellectual disability” either as a footnote to the history of mental pathology dominated by mental illness, or of disability dominated by the physical disability’ (Goodey, A History
of Intelligence and “Intellectual Disability”). This paper seeks to investigate the constructedness of medieval concepts and categories of intellectual impairment, including the problem of imposing modern definitions of ‘cognitive /intellectual/ mental
disability’ onto the past. Philosophically, and subsequently judicially, medieval intellectual disability was considered the absence of reason, which contrasted the mentally disabled with the Aristotelian concept of man as the rational animal. Although normative
texts will be the primary focus of the paper, some consideration will be given as to how these concepts affected quotidian life for mentally disabled persons, especially by looking afresh at the popular stereotype of the medieval court fool or jester.
—
The seminar will take place in the Wellcome Library, 183 Euston Road, London, NW1 2BE.
Doors open at 6pm prompt, the seminar will start at 6.15pm.
With best wishes,
Ross
Ross MacFarlane
Research Engagement Officer
Wellcome Library
Wellcome Trust
Gibbs Building
215 Euston Road
London NW1 2BE, UK
T +44 (0)20 7611 7340
F +44 (0)20 7611 8369
We are a global charitable foundation dedicated to achieving extraordinary improvements in human and animal health. We support the brightest minds in biomedical research and the medical humanities. Our breadth
of support includes public engagement, education and the application of research to improve health. We are independent of both political and commercial interests.
The Wellcome Trust is a charity registered in England and Wales, no. 210183. Its sole trustee is The Wellcome Trust Limited, a company registered in England and Wales, no. 2711000 (whose registered office is
at 215 Euston Road, London NW1 2BE, UK).
Follow the Wellcome Library on Twitter and Facebook