[Neuropsychiatric associations in Belgium: from foundation to separation (1869-2008)]

Background Professional associations have traditionally been important to the specialization process and identity of medical specialists. Psychiatry and neurology share common origins in the 19th century and subsequently went through a major evolution. However, relatively little is known about the role of neuropsychiatric associations. Aim To provide a concise historical overview of the Belgian neuropsychiatric associations and understand the factors that mattered in their formation and dissolution. Method Descriptive research based on oral testimonies, archival material, journals of the concerned associations and secondary literature. Results In 1869, the then ‘alienists’ founded the first Belgian psychiatric association. Subsequently, three fault lines – professional associations versus scientific associations, regional versus national associations, neurological versus psychiatric associations – led to the current neurological and psychiatric associations in Belgium. Conclusion Over time, the neuropsychiatric associations have helped define the identity of neurology and psychiatry. On the other hand, the associations themselves have been subject to both substantive factors, i.e. the evolution of the discipline, and non-substantive factors. The latter are specific to Belgium and concern linguistic struggles and a historically created split between scientific associations and professional associations.

SCIENTIFIC PERSONAS IN THEORY AND PRACTICE – WAYS OF CREATING SCIENTIFIC, SCHOLARLY, AND ARTISTIC IDENTITIES

The concept of scientific persona was developed by historians of science at the Max Planck Institute in Berlin fifteen years ago in order to understand how science works and how it can be conducted in a credible way. The Latin word persona means mask and the discussions of the term were elaborations of Marcel Mauss´s introduction of the concept in an article published in 1938 (Mauss 1938). In Mauss´s conceptualisation, persona was a feature that characterized societies in an evolutionary stage—a stage where members of the society had started to perceive themselves as individuals, but were still expected to fulfill certain, culturally defined roles. In such contexts, persona was not mask to cover the ‘real’ self of the performer, but a mask that enhanced certain features of the person. Transferring Mauss’s approach to the scientific world, Lorraine Daston and Otto Sibum (2003) defined, in an often cited article in Science in Context, scientific persona as an intermediate between individual biography and social (scientific) institution: it is a cultural identity that forms the individual in body and mind, and creates a collective with a shared and recognizable physiognomy (ways to be and to behave). Daston and Sibum characterized scientific personas as templates that emerge and develop in historical contexts and used the concept to investigate the creation of certain types of scientists: when, how and why have distinct “scientific personae” emerged?

From transnational to regional magnetic fevers: The making of a law on hypnotism in late nineteenth-century Belgium

In May 1892, Belgium adopted a law on the exercise of hypnotism. The signing of the law constituted a temporary endpoint to six years of debate on the dangers and promises of hypnotism, a process of negotiation between medical doctors, members of parliament, legal professionals and lay practitioners. The terms of the debate were not very different from what happened elsewhere in Europe, where, since the mid 1880s, hypnotism had become an object of public concern. The Belgian law was nevertheless unique in its combined effort to regulate the use of hypnosis in public and private, for purposes of entertainment, research and therapy. My analysis shows how the making of the law was a process of negotiation in which local, national and transnational networks and allegiances each played a part. While the transnational atmosphere of moral panic had created a seedbed for the law, its eventual outlook owed much to the powerful lobby work of an essentially local network of lay magnetizers, and to the renown of Joseph Delbœuf, professor at the University of Liège, whose work in the field of hypnotism stimulated several liberal doctors and members of Parliament from the Liège region to defend a more lenient law.

[Knowledge in the plural. For a 'generous' history of science]

Even if C.P. Snow's sharp distinction between a scientific and a literary culture has often been contested, historians still mostly conceive these cultures as two separate fields. The authors of this article argue that the potential scope of the history of science is regrettably limited by this dichotomy. Recent developments within the history of science have made clear that scholars of both 'cultures' share workplaces, practices and self-images to a large extent, and that even natural scientists heavily rely on artistic representations. The recognition of these commonalities can contribute to a full integration of the human sciences into the history of science and, more generally, into cultural history. This evolution is further stimulated by the transdisciplinary approach which has recently become dominant within the history of the human sciences itself. Since the newly founded journal takes part in these fruitful tendencies, the authors welcome Studium as a promising enterprise.

Science, an ally of feminism? Isabelle Gatti de Gamond on women and science

Cet essai analyse la façon dont Isabelle Gatti de Gamond (1839-1905), l'une des principales féministes belges du XIXe siècle, définissait les rapports entre les femmes et la science.

Même si les revendications effectives de Gatti de Gamond étaient très radicales, son discours sur la femme partageait les motifs du discours générique qui était dominant dans la culture de la deuxième moitié du XIXe siècle. Sa représentation des rapports entre les sexes supposait une différence fondamentale entre l'homme et la femme, une équivalence ou une « égalité dans la différence », plutôt qu'une égalité tout court.

Pendant la première partie de sa carrière, Gatti de Gamond resta proche d'une vision traditionnelle et assez abstraite de la différence sexuelle, une différence située surtout au niveau de la mission et de la destinée féminine et masculine, inscrite dans une différence, interprétée métaphysiquement, de "nature". Plus tard, la différence entre les sexes fut définie en fonction d'une distinction établie scientifiquement. Il s'agissait notamment d'une différence sexuelle enracinée biologiquement, mais légitimée et fortifiée par une division sociologique entre les sexes. Même son exaltation romantique de la femme trouvait place dans cette image scientiste, non seulement parce qu'elle partait des mêmes oppositions sexuées, mais aussi parce que l'œuvre sociologique dont Gatti de Gamond s'inspirait, possédait un fort potentiel nostalgique. Sa pensée sur la relation entre les femmes et la science partageait les mêmes prémisses. Elle se basait sur des frontières strictes entre les champs de connaissance et les approches cognitives masculines d'une part, féminines de l'autre, même si les femmes bénéficiaient de la possibilité de surpasser quelques-unes de ces frontières et d'exercer, intellectuellement ou moralement, une influence salutaire.