Invention of hysteria
Subtitle: Charcot and the photographic iconography of the Salpêtrière
By: Georges Didi-Huberman ; translated by Alisa Hartz.
Contributors: Charcot, J. M. 1825-1893.
Publisher: MIT Press
Published: 2003
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass
Language: eng
Number of pages: 373
Subjects: Salpêtrière (Hospital); Hysteria -- History; Mental illness -- Pictorial works; Facial expression
Genres: Pictorial works.
Work titles: Invention de l'hysterie.
Description: "In this classic of French cultural studies, Georges Didi-Huberman traces the intimate and reciprocal relationship between the disciplines of psychiatry and photography in the late nineteenth century. Focusing on the immense photographic output of the Salpetriere hospital, the notorious Parisian asylum for insane and incurable women, Didi-Huberman shows the crucial role played by photography in the invention of the category of hysteria. Under the direction of the medical teacher and clinician Jean-Martin Charcot, the inmates of the Salpetriere identified as hysterics were methodically photographed, providing skeptical colleagues with visual proof of hysteria's specific form. These images, many of which appear in this book, provided the materials for the multivolume album Iconographie photographique de la Salpetriere."--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.