At around seven in the evening on 1 September 1743 in the French Indian colony of Pondichéry, Santouche heard screaming […]
Call in the Midwife: Gendered Medical Knowledge and Colonial Intermediaries in French India
On October 29th, 1743 at seven o’clock in the morning in the city of Pondichéry–a former French colony in South […]
“Mistreatment by Words and Blows”: Domestic Violence between Lived Realities and Colonial Meanings
The evidence of domestic violence in eighteenth-century Pondichéry – France’s former colony in South Asia – resides in what might […]
Listening to Women Nurses and Caretakers: A Case Study from the Smallpox Epidemic Among North Carolina Moravians
As we reflect on how COVID-19 continues to shape society, the centrality of nursing during health care emergencies becomes clear. […]
Fetal Remains, Knowledge, and the Making of Early Modern Monsters
In 1734, scholars at France’s Royal Academy of Medicine encountered something unique: a tiny, nearly perfect replica of a fetus […]
A Tale of Two Deaths: Chronic Illness, Race, and the Medicalization of Suicide
On a Thursday morning in 1726, French colonial officials in Pondichéry – France’s principal colonial holding on India’s southeastern coast […]
Emigration as Epidemic: Perspectives on the Eighteenth-Century Scottish Highlands
In our digital age, the contagion metaphor is often part of the language we use regarding the exchange of information. […]
What Would Philippe Pinel Do? Old and New Understandings of Mental Illness
I was intrigued when, on February 1, 2018, I heard the journalist and author Johann Hari on Democracy Now! talking […]
Why Eighteenth-Century Hangriness Might Be A Thing (And Why It Matters)
Captured by Abenaki Indians from New Hampshire in 1724, the Englishwoman Elizabeth Hanson described how after a disappointing hunt, her […]
