Numbing the pains of modernity: Sensory deprivation, and post-war psychology in Canada (1948-1974)
Daniel’s dissertation is an interdisciplinary history of how “numbness” came to be studied and disciplined to model the effects of modernity on the human body in Canada and the United States during the 20th century. Through studies of sensory deprivation, overstimulation, isolation, and addiction, this project traces how numbness became an object of scientific and…
Read MoreDelivering the universal reformation: Letters, networks, and intellectual exchange in the Hartlib Circle, 1658-1662
Hannah’s project, “Delivering the Universal Reformation: Letters, Networks, and Intellectual Exchange in the Hartlib Circle, 1658–1662,” examines the final years of the Hartlib Circle, one of the seventeenth century’s largest intellectual networks. Historians have explained the group’s decline by pointing to political change, the increasing specialization of science and medicine, and changing religious ideas. Hannah’s…
Read More‘In the business of changing lives’: Activist knowledge-practices and the founding of consumer/survivor businesses in southwest Ontario (1980-2005)
Danielle’s doctoral research draws on extensive interview (n=42) and archival data to consider the significance of collectively remembering, preserving and sharing mad people’s activist histories. The central question guiding her work is: What is the significance of the historical emergence of consumer/survivor businesses to the consumer/survivor/ex-patient movement? She explores that question by examining how in…
Read MoreWhen life loses its zest: The origins of self-help literature for mental health, 1918-1939
Matthew’s project examines the origin, evolution, and impact of self-help literature written by American mental health practitioners during the interwar period. It focuses on the work of three authors: the psychologist H. Addington Bruce, the psychiatrist Abraham Myerson, and the psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Karl Menninger. These experts published multiple self-help books and articles that communicated…
Read MoreOn the table, in the books: Conversion therapy in Canadian healthcare education, 1941-1991
On the Table, In the Books traces the place of “conversion therapy” (CT) in Canada’s medical education system during the mid-twentieth century. Medical professionals in North America historically framed non-conformity to cisgender/heterosexual behaviour as a health issue, legitimizing psychiatric and psychological attempts at “curing” 2S/LGBTQIA+ sexualities, genders and bodies across time. These treatments were not,…
Read MoreInfrastructures of Canadian psychiatry under the Meyerian diaspora
Alex’s project examines the proliferation and impact of new reform ideas in psychiatry developed by the Johns Hopkins psychiatrist Adolf Meyer, and the spread of his ideas by trainees who adapted his reforms both inside and outside of psychiatry in Canada throughout the twentieth century in ways that are relevant today. Scholars still do not…
Read More“More to the design than just architecture”: Practices, philosophies, and architectures of care, 1960-1995
The architectures of long-term and palliative care have resisted related typologies, like hospitals, in the same way that the hospice philosophy resists the medical desire to cure. Fiona’s dissertation explores what care, as an evolving concept, has looked like to architects in North America and the UK since the 1960’s. It considers how architecture has…
Read MoreThe history of eugenics in French Canada, 1880s-1940s
In the early 20th century, eugenics—a science concerned primarily with the “improvement of the human race” by means of selective breeding—rose to prominence in nearly every country across the globe and left a profound impact on science and society. Eugenicists theorized that many social problems could be fixed by encouraging “fit” individuals to marry and…
Read MoreColonial landscapes: Public health programming, health districts, and nutrition education in Alberta, 1920s – 1960s
Emily’s dissertation studies the creation and expansion of public health programming with a focus on nutrition in Alberta from the 1920s to the 1960s, primarily in rural and northern areas. In the Prairies, where concerns of land dominated provincial concerns, public health, food, and nutrition were inextricably connected with the land. The discovery of macro-…
Read MoreMeeting Demands for Animal Healthcare: Veterinary Medicine in Rural Southern Ontario, 1862-1939
Before veterinarians populated the countryside, people had limited access to health knowledge and relied on experienced neighbours or medical doctors to practice animal healthcare. Jody’s dissertation examines the interdependence between animal, human, and environmental health to show advancements in public health and the role veterinary medicine had in shaping our current understanding of modern medicine…
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