Old Email Archive

digest 2006-03-24 #001.txt

litsci-l-digest         Friday, March 24 2006         Volume 01 : Number
146



In this issue:

     SUB 06 Evolving Humanistic Perspectives on Medicine
     SLSA 06 Working Panel Proposal -- need presenters

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Date: Wed, 22 Mar 2006 08:57:43 -0600
From: "Joshua Dolezal" 
Subject: SUB 06 Evolving Humanistic Perspectives on Medicine


"Persuasion and Reform: Oliver Wendell Holmes and the Rhetoric of
Medical Science"=20

Joshua Dolezal

Central College

=20

KEYWORDS: clinical medicine, American literature, rhetoric, medical
humanities

=20

This paper examines Holmes's role as a catalyst in the re-imagination of
the scientific physician in American literature. One of Hawthorne's
closest friends, Holmes devoted much of his literary and scientific work
to medical reform, establishing himself as the patient's advocate by
arguing against poor hygiene in "The Contagiousness of Puerperal Fever"
and by exposing reckless therapeutics in "Homoeopathy and Its Kindred
Delusions." Holmes's medical principles were heavily influenced by the
French clinical tradition, particularly by his mentor Pierre Louis.
Bringing the clinical method to bear on his practice of medicine in the
United States, Holmes stressed the role of storytelling in medicine by
engaging the popular imagination with accessible, science-driven
metaphors. His medical reforms may have been reactions to the
caricatures of medical scientists in Hawthorne's short fiction and other
nineteenth-century American literature.



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Date: Fri, 24 Mar 2006 00:15:49 -0600
From: Brahnam 
Subject: SLSA 06 Working Panel Proposal -- need presenters

This is a call for presenters for the following panel for SLSA 2006.
Please send proposals ASAP. My email is below.

PANEL PROPOSAL FOR SLSA 2006 Sheryl Brahnam, Dept. of
Computer Information Systems, Missouri State University,
Panel Organizer and Chair

Ideas for titles solicited.

Panel abstract (draft):

Kenneth Gross in his essay "Moving statues, Talking
Statues" imagines the day when sculptures step off their
pedestals to join us for dinner. He is certain we will
need a manual for dealing with these animated sculptures,
a helpful "handbook (suitable for poets, critics, and
sculptors--at once a history, a book of spells, a courtesy
manual, and a diagnostic treatise)" that will tell us how
properly to address them, how set the table for them, how
lead them out of their delusions and misconceptions, and
how, if necessary, to insult and even to destroy them.

That day--when human artifacts show up for dinner--is
rapidly approaching. Technology is evolving, separating
itself from the human to become a myriad of life forms. As
robots and virtual creatures begin to populate our social
space, fragments of "a history, a book of spells, a
courtesy manual, and a diagnostic treatise" are taking
shape.

This panel will explore philosophy, literature, and the
study of human-computer interaction with the intent of
piecing together some of these fragments. What is it we
are being told to do, and why? Of what are we being
warned, and of what promised? In a word, how are we to
greet these approaching social intruders?

KEYWORDS:  Ideas for keywords solicited

Dr. Sheryl Brahnam
Assistant Professor CIS
Missouri State University 
sbrahnam (at) misssouristate (dot) edu
or
 mailto:research@knockloudly.com 



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