Michael Brown | Roehampton University (original) (raw)
I specialise in the social and cultural history of late eighteenth- and nineteenth-century British medicine and am particularly interested in the cultures, ideologies and politics of the British medical profession. My first book, 'Performing Medicine', explores the transformation of British medicine from a late eighteenth-century culture of polite sociability, civic inclusivity and intellectual liberality to a nineteenth-century model of disciplinary exclusivity, social utility and collective professional self-identification.
In my other published work I have built upon these established research interests, exploring such issues as public health and the gendered identities of medical practitioners. My most recent article, for example, examines cultures of libel within early nineteenth-century medical reform and their relationship to the stylistics of radical political expression.
In addition to my specific interests in the history of medicine, I am also interested in a range of social and cultural historical topics, including the relationships between war and gender and I have recently undertaken research into the impact of military technology on conceptions of martial masculinities in the age of New Imperialism.
I am currently in the process of developing my next major research project which is concerned with the place of emotion and affect in pre-anaesthetic surgery. More specifically, it proposes to explore the flowering of a culture of sensibility within early nineteenth-century surgery, linking this increasing concern to understand and mitigate the pain and suffering of patients with developments in surgical self-presentation and the politically-charged campaign to reform the structures and ideologies of surgical practice.
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Books by Michael Brown
When did medicine become modern? This book takes a fresh look at one of the most important quest... more When did medicine become modern? This book takes a fresh look at one of the most important questions in the history of medicine. It explores how the cultures, values and meanings of medicine were transformed across the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries as its practitioners came to submerge their local identities as urbane and learned gentlemen into the ideal of a nationwide and scientifically-based medical profession.
Moving beyond traditional accounts of professionalization it adopts a cultural historical approach to the subject, demonstrating how visions of what medicine was and might be were shaped by wider social and political forces, from the eighteenth-century values of civic gentility to the radical and socially progressive ideologies of the age of reform. Focusing on the provincial English city of York, it draws on a rich and wide-ranging archival record, including letters, diaries, newspapers and portraits, to reveal how these changes took place at the level of everyday practice, experience and representation.
Performing medicine reveals the cultural and ideological roots of modern British medicine, including its emphasis upon the values of expertise and public service. It therefore has important implications for the way we think about medicine in the present day, especially in its relationship to the public and the state. As such it will be of interest to those who are concerned with British medicine’s current state and future course and will prove invaluable to historians of medicine as well as to students of civic culture and the age of reform.
Papers by Michael Brown
This article considers the reception and representation of advanced military technology in late n... more This article considers the reception and representation of advanced military technology in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Britain. It argues that technologies such as the breech-loading rifle and the machine gun existed in an ambiguous relationship with contemporary ideas about martial masculinities and in many cases served to fuel anxieties about the physical prowess of the British soldier. In turn, these anxieties encouraged a preoccupation in both military and popular domains with that most visceral of weapons, the bayonet, an obsession which was to have profound consequences for British military thinking at the dawn of the First World War.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, a... more JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
In Performing Medicine Michael Brown seeks to fill a surprising vacuum in English medical history... more In Performing Medicine Michael Brown seeks to fill a surprising vacuum in English medical history: the social position and cultural status of the regional medical practitioner. He wishes to understand where such persons fitted in the array of ranks and occupations, and how they operated within given spheres and pressed sometimes to transform them. The 'provincial England' of the title is the city of York.
Thorps in a changing landscape, Explorations in Local and Regional History ser. vol. 4, ser. eds.... more Thorps in a changing landscape, Explorations in Local and Regional History ser. vol. 4, ser. eds. Nigel Goose and Christopher Dyer (Hatfield: University of Hertfordshire Press, 2011. Pp. xviii + 224. 47 maps. 9 tabs. ISBN 9781902806822 Pbk. £14.99/$29.95)
Drafts by Michael Brown
When did medicine become modern? This book takes a fresh look at one of the most important quest... more When did medicine become modern? This book takes a fresh look at one of the most important questions in the history of medicine. It explores how the cultures, values and meanings of medicine were transformed across the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries as its practitioners came to submerge their local identities as urbane and learned gentlemen into the ideal of a nationwide and scientifically-based medical profession.
Moving beyond traditional accounts of professionalization it adopts a cultural historical approach to the subject, demonstrating how visions of what medicine was and might be were shaped by wider social and political forces, from the eighteenth-century values of civic gentility to the radical and socially progressive ideologies of the age of reform. Focusing on the provincial English city of York, it draws on a rich and wide-ranging archival record, including letters, diaries, newspapers and portraits, to reveal how these changes took place at the level of everyday practice, experience and representation.
Performing medicine reveals the cultural and ideological roots of modern British medicine, including its emphasis upon the values of expertise and public service. It therefore has important implications for the way we think about medicine in the present day, especially in its relationship to the public and the state. As such it will be of interest to those who are concerned with British medicine’s current state and future course and will prove invaluable to historians of medicine as well as to students of civic culture and the age of reform.
This article considers the reception and representation of advanced military technology in late n... more This article considers the reception and representation of advanced military technology in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Britain. It argues that technologies such as the breech-loading rifle and the machine gun existed in an ambiguous relationship with contemporary ideas about martial masculinities and in many cases served to fuel anxieties about the physical prowess of the British soldier. In turn, these anxieties encouraged a preoccupation in both military and popular domains with that most visceral of weapons, the bayonet, an obsession which was to have profound consequences for British military thinking at the dawn of the First World War.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, a... more JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
In Performing Medicine Michael Brown seeks to fill a surprising vacuum in English medical history... more In Performing Medicine Michael Brown seeks to fill a surprising vacuum in English medical history: the social position and cultural status of the regional medical practitioner. He wishes to understand where such persons fitted in the array of ranks and occupations, and how they operated within given spheres and pressed sometimes to transform them. The 'provincial England' of the title is the city of York.
Thorps in a changing landscape, Explorations in Local and Regional History ser. vol. 4, ser. eds.... more Thorps in a changing landscape, Explorations in Local and Regional History ser. vol. 4, ser. eds. Nigel Goose and Christopher Dyer (Hatfield: University of Hertfordshire Press, 2011. Pp. xviii + 224. 47 maps. 9 tabs. ISBN 9781902806822 Pbk. £14.99/$29.95)