Home » Archives for November 2011

Medical Humanities Blog

Against the Very Idea of the Politicization of Public Health Policy

Posted: 29 Nov 2011 08:26 AM PST

Daniel S. Goldberg (East Carolina University) has a new article out in the American Journal of Public Health (First Look) entitled Against the Very Idea of the Politicization of Public Health Policy. Here is the Abstract:

I criticize the concern over the politicization of public health policy as a justification for preferring a narrow to a broad model of public health.

My critique proceeds along 2 lines. First, the fact that administrative structures and actors are primary sources of public health policy demonstrates its inescapably political and politicized nature. Second, historical evidence shows that public health in Great Britain and the United States has from its very inception been political and politicized.

I conclude by noting legitimate ethical concerns regarding the political nature of public health policy and argue that open deliberation in a democratic social order is best served by acknowledging the constraints of the inescapably politicized process of public health policymaking.

As ever, comments and feedback are most welcome.

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Law & Humanities Blog

Law, Politics, Poland, and "High Noon"
A "Reverse CSI Effect"?
The Reception of the Code Napoleon In the German States
Husbands, Wives, and Early Federalist Thought

Law, Politics, Poland, and "High Noon"

Posted: 28 Nov 2011 03:20 PM PST

Michal Kuz, Louisiana State University Department of Political Science, has published 'High Noon' and Polish Republican Symbolism in Relation to American Political Culture. Here is the abstract.

This paper examines the fate of certain Polish republican symbols and notions with reference to the American political culture. It focuses especially on the image of Gary Cooper from High Noon that became a widely recognized symbol of the first Polish free elections after World War II. The histories of modern Polish and American republicanisms are, however, intertwined since the very beginning of both traditions of political thought. Unfortunately, because of unfavorable geopolitical circumstances and internal turmoil Poles lost their first state. Hamilton wrote that due to its 'anarchy and weakness' Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was: 'unfit for self-government and self-defense' (Federalists 2001, 94). This anarchy, embodied by the liberum-veto rule, was, nevertheless, a corrupted form of political individualism that made Polish political culture so similar to the American one. In line with that tradition when in 1989 for the first time since World War II time Polish citizens voted in elections over which Moscow had no substantive influence, the pro-democratic Solidarity block used a picture of Garry Cooper from the film 'High Noon' on its posters. The sheriff, who wore a 'Solidarity' badge was; holding not a gun, but a folded ballot. 'July the 6th, 'High Noon' - said the slogan. The message was clear. It said that it is time for every citizen to make an individual decision about what he thinks is right and do so disregarding the multitude of those, who may want to oppose such a decision. Referring to that specific film suggested that even against the many, the cause of the democratic opposition would prevail. Indeed this approach may be deemed the positive 'liberum veto.'

Download the paper from SSRN at the link.

A "Reverse CSI Effect"?

Posted: 28 Nov 2011 03:16 PM PST

Mark Godsey, University of Cincinnati College of Law, and Marie Alou have published She Blinded Me with Science: Wrongful Convictions and the 'Reverse CSI-Effect' in volume 17 of Texas Wesleyan Law Review (2011). Here is the abstract.

Prosecutors in the United States are often heard to complain these days of the "CSI-effect.'' Jurors today, the theory goes, have become spoiled as a result of the proliferation of these "high-tech" forensic shows, and now unrealistically expect conclusive scientific proof of guilt before they will convict. What I have come to notice, however, is a different kind a reverberation from the CSI-type shows that I believe often hurts defendants and benefits the prosecution. While not reported or discussed in the popular media as is the "CSI Effect," the other side of the coin, which I will call the "Reverse CSI Effect:' may be more damaging to the criminal justice system and the interests of justice than the opposite impact of which prosecutors complain.

The "Reverse CSI Effect," as I call it, can be stated as follows: while jurors may have come to expect, as a result of CSI-type shows, high-tech forensic testimony in criminal cases, and may inappropriately acquit when such evidence is lacking, these same jurors, as a result of these same CSI-type shows, often place too much weight on forensic evidence in cases where forensic evidence IS in fact produced by the prosecution, resulting in convictions in cases where the defendant probably should have been acquitted.
Download the article from SSRN at the link.

The Reception of the Code Napoleon In the German States

Posted: 28 Nov 2011 02:57 PM PST

T. T. Arvind, University of York, York Law School, and Lindsay James Stirton, University of Sheffield Law School, have published Explaining the Reception of the Code Napoleon in Germany: A Fuzzy-Set Qualitative Comparative Analysis, at 30 Legal Studies 1 (2010). Here is the abstract.

This paper examines the diverse responses of the German states to the Code Napoleon at the beginning of the nineteenth century. These states differed both in the extent to which they adopted the Code, and the extent to which they retained the Code after Napoleon's influence waned. In order to identify the causes of adoption and retention of the Code, we use fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). This method is now well established in comparative research in the social sciences but has been little used in comparative legal analysis. We find the following to be among the conditions relevant to the reception of the Code: territorial diversity, control by Napoleon, central state institutions, a feudal economy and society, liberal (enlightened absolutist) rule, nativism among the governing elites and popular anti-French sentiment. The paper also serves to demonstrate the potential of fsQCA as a method for comparative lawyers.

The full text is not available from SSRN.

Husbands, Wives, and Early Federalist Thought

Posted: 28 Nov 2011 02:58 PM PST

Angela Fernandez, University of Toronto Faculty of Law, has published Tapping Reeve, Nathan Dane, and James Kent: Three Fading Federalists on Marital Unity. Here is the abstract.

Tapping Reeve wrote in his treatise on the law of husband and wife, Baron and Femme (1816), that husband and wife were not one person in law. His rejection of Blackstone's maxim is not as well-known as it should be. Yet, his position was not idiosyncratic, as it was also adopted by Nathan Dane in his important General Abridgment and Digest of American Law (1823). However, James Kent did not follow it in his Commentaries on American Law (1826-30). This paper explores whether Dane's agreement with Reeve in rebelling against marital unity was based on their New England background (Reeve lived in Connecticut and Dane in Massachusetts), which Kent (from New York) simply did not share. Reeve, Dane, and Kent were all "Fading Federalists," using their legal expertise and their position as law book writers and law teachers as a way to continue to exert influence lost to them in the political world. They turned to the creation of an American common law as a way to continue to have influence on what America would become. Like Reeve, Dane was involved in various moral campaigns, including the temperance movement, which was an early kind of women's movement. He was also religious like Reeve and against slavery -- according to some, Dane was responsible for the anti-slavery clause in the North West Ordinance. Kent was not interested in these causes or interests and, indeed, considered those who were to be fanatics or zealots. This helps explain why, when he wrote about married women he was inclined to choose the traditional English approach, Coke and Blackstone, over the indigenous position that jurists in New England were cultivating that sought to emphasize the rights of married women.

Download the paper from SSRN at the link.

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Medical Humanities Blog

On 'The Humanising Power of Medical History'

Posted: 23 Nov 2011 08:11 AM PST

John Harley Warner (Yale, History of Medicine) has a fascinating paper out in Medical Humanities 37, no.

2 entitled The humanising power of medical history: responses to biomedicine in the 20th century United States.

Here is the Abstract:

Most American historians of medicine today would be very hesitant about any claim that medical history humanises doctors, medical students or the larger health care enterprise. Yet, the idea that history can and ought to serve modern medicine as a humanising force has been a persistent refrain in American medicine. This essay explores the emergence of this idea from the end of the 19th century, precisely the moment when modern biomedicine became ascendant. At the same institutions where the new version of scientific medicine was most energetically embraced, some professional leaders warned that the allegiance to science driving the profession's technical and cultural success was endangering humanistic values fundamental to professionalism and the art of medicine. They saw in history a means for rehumanising modern medicine and countering the risk of cultural crisis. While some iteration of this vision of history was remarkably durable, the meanings attached to 'humanism' were both multiple and changing, and the role envisioned for history in a humanistic intervention was transformed. Starting in the 1960s as part of a larger cultural critique of the putative 'dehumanisation' of the medical establishment, some advocates promoted medical history as a tool to help fashion a new kind of humanist physician and to confront social inequities in the health care system. What has persisted across time is the way that the idea of history as a humanising force has almost always functioned as a discourse of deficiency—a response to perceived shortcomings of biomedicine, medical institutions and medical professionalism.

Especially inasmuch as it seeks to contextualize and explore the relationship between the history of medicine and the medical and health humanities, the article is highly recommended.

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Medical Humanities Blog

Call for Papers: Learning from Lister: Antisepsis, Safer Surgery, and Global Health

Posted: 21 Nov 2011 12:09 PM PST

Taken from the Conference website:

Joseph Lister, 1st Baron Lister of Lyme Regis, was Professor of Clinical Surgery at King's College London from 1877 – 1893.

Having developed his methods of antiseptic surgery at the Universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh, Lister brought ideas and techniques to King's College Hospital which would prove foundational to subsequent conceptions and practice of surgery and medicine. Lister's methods of promoting sterility of the surgical field before, during and after operation – his 'system' – evolved throughout his career and were grounded in antisepsis. They were paralleled and contested by practices which approached the problem by aiming for asepsis and cleanliness of surgical technique and environment.

In March 2012, King's College London will be hosting a major conference on Lister's life, methods and ideas, and will be examining both the significance of his techniques in their historical context, and the enduring impact that Lister has had on twentieth- and twenty-first-century medical and surgical practice. Marking the hundredth anniversary of Lister's death, the conference will be of interest to academic historians, clinical and healthcare scientists and practitioners , bioscience, health policy and management professionals, and those with an interest in Lister, Listerism and the development of antiseptic surgery.

The conference will be run in association with the Royal Society and the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons, and events will take place at both of these institutions and at the King's College London Strand Campus.

Here is a link to the Call for Papers, and to the Guidance for Abstract Submissions.

(h/t Lit&Med listserv)

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UCL Centre for Digital Humanities

QRator in the Horizon Report: Museum Edition

Posted: 19 Nov 2011 05:39 AM PST

The QRator project, a collaboration between UCLDH, CASA and UCL Museums, funded by the Beacon for Public Engagement, has been chosen for inclusion in the 2011 Museum edition of the Horizon report, produced by the New Media Consortium. The Horizon Report is an international report about leading museum technologies. The report's main aim is to identify [...]

Law & Humanities Blog

Don Quixote and Law

Posted: 17 Nov 2011 07:32 PM PST

From Jose Calvo González, University of Malaga, the announcement of a conference at the Centro de Ciências Jurídicas, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina (Florianópolis. Brazil), organized by Dr. Luis Carlos Cancellier de Olivo, and as part of the de Pos-Graduação en Direito. The conference, "Seminar on Law and Literature," will take place from November 28 to December 2, 2011. As part of the Conference, Professor Calvo González will give a talk, "Don Quixote and Law." He will also deliver the closing lecture, "Puppetry and Law: Sancho´s Justice and judgements in the puppet opera " VIDA DO GRANDE D. Quixote de la Mancha e do gordo Sancho Pança, by António José da Silva.(1705-1739)."

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UCL Centre for Digital Humanities

Blogs, Tweets and Open Access

Posted: 17 Nov 2011 07:58 AM PST

UCLDH’s Deputy Director, Melissa Terras’s work using social media and Open Access is featured today in the Times Higher. Melissa has been carrying out an experiment into the way that social media can be used to make the most of the impact of her research. In recent weeks she has been uploading her publications to [...]

Law & Humanities Blog

Crime On Display

Posted: 13 Nov 2011 04:20 PM PST

Laura Huey, University of Western Ontario, has published Crime behind the glass: Exploring the sublime in crime at the Vienna Kriminalmuseum at 15 Theoretical Criminology 381 (November 2011). Here is the abstract.

Scholars have noted an ever-increasing growth in the number of crime-themed leisure and tourism venues. Within this article I examine one such site: the Vienna Kriminalmuseum. An analysis of this site provides an opportunity to explore how the 'sublime in crime' is presented to the Museum's visitors in ways that intentionally merge the macabre with the educational. This presentation says much, I suggest, not only about the Museum's goals, but about its intended audience, an audience seeking to be exposed to elements of the darkest side of humanity, now sanitized for wider public consumption through the union of educational and entertainment strategies.

Hat tip to NuT.

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Law & Humanities Blog

More On the Intersection of Bob Dylan and the Law

Posted: 10 Nov 2011 11:11 AM PST

Another lawyer inspired by Bob Dylan's work: Philadelphia's Tom Kline. More here.

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Medical Humanities Blog

Call for Applications: TT Assistant Professor, "Health and Humanities," Emory University

Posted: 10 Nov 2011 10:15 AM PST

EMORY UNIVERSITY, ATLANTA, GA. Health and Humanities. Assistant Professor (tenure-track), beginning Fall 2012. Four courses per year, beginning undergraduate to graduate level. Usual advising, committee, and other non-teaching duties. PhD required. This position is one of several new faculty appointments in the humanities made possible by support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

These interdisciplinary appointments seek to bridge humanistic inquiry with other disciplines by applying its traditional principles to new fields of study; by examining traditional areas of research and teaching by means of new approaches; and by exporting principles of humanistic inquiry across not only the humanities but the academy much more broadly.

Through this tenure-track position in Health and Humanities, Emory University wishes to add to its strengths in interdisciplinary scholarship and is looking for an innovative scholar and teacher who will be based in the humanities but can speak beyond their discipline. Preference will be given to those candidates who have training in both the humanities and a health-related field and/or who can provide evidence of collaboration with a health-related field. The successful candidate will be expected to collaborate with and benefit from associations with the many health-related schools outside of Emory College. Broadly defined fields of interest appropriate for this position include but are not limited to: biopolitics and medical technologies; history of medicine and public health; philosophies of life and well-being; race, social justice, and health disparities; literature and illness/health; and health and healing.

The successful applicant will have a tenure home in a particular humanities department, but it is expected that their research and teaching interests will bridge different schools within the University. This position is open to scholars across the humanities and arts, including African American Studies, anthropology, area studies, arts and art history, communications, film and media studies, history, all literature and language departments, psychoanalytic studies, religion, philosophy, science and technology studies, and women's, gender and sexuality studies. Review of applications begins December 1, 2011; finalists will be invited for campus visits beginning in February 2012. Applications received by December 15, 2011 will be given full consideration. Applications should include a cover letter that addresses the position description,current c.v.,writing sample,teaching portfolio,and three confidential letters of reference. Email applications to Jamie Weems at mellon1@emory.edu. Nominations are invited. Emory University is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer, and actively seeks applications from women and minorities.

(h/t H-NET)

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Law & Humanities Blog

Upcoming Events

Posted: 09 Nov 2011 03:32 PM PST

A wonderful list of upcoming conferences, workshops, and other events in the legal history area from Rechtgeschiedenis Blog.

The Poetry of (the) Law

Posted: 09 Nov 2011 03:25 PM PST

John C. Kleefeld, University of Saskatchewan, College of Law, has published From Brouhahas to Brehon Laws: Poetic Impulse in the Law, at 4 Law and Humanities 21 (2010). Here is the abstract.

Over the ages and across the lands, poetry and the law have coming led in courtroom and classroom, debuted together in judicial decisions and dissents, and emerged as one in systems as diverse as the Courts of Equity and the law of the brehons - the poet-judges of ancient Ireland. Lyrical language and the poetic impulse have thus helped to inform, persuade, and advance the law.

Under the literary conceit of a time travel, the author considers the persistence of poetry in law, addressing the artistic expression of devotees and the commentary of critics. Manifestations of the poetic impulse include poetry as ornament to legal argument, judgments written in poetic form (hence the brouhahas), and the use in law of metre, metaphor, imagination, ambiguity, alliteration, and rhyme. The role of poetry in legal education, from Coke's Reports in Verse to law school haiku, is also traversed. Accompany the author on his journey through the legal ages and hear his case for a continued, albeit cautious, role for poetry-in-law.

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Law & Humanities Blog

The Hanseatic League As a Functional Overlapping Competing Jurisdiction

Posted: 08 Nov 2011 11:51 AM PST

Alexander Fink, University of Leipzig, has published The Hanseatic League and the Concept of Functional Overlapping Competing Jurisdictions. Here is the abstract.

In light of the concept of functional overlapping competing jurisdictions (FOCJ) discussed by Frey and Eichenberger (1996, 1999, 2000) I analyze the Hanseatic League; the medieval association of northern European traders and cities that existed from the 12th to the 17th century. I show that the Hanseatic League came close to representing an example of a FOCJ. But in contrast to the FOCJ outlined by Frey and Eichenberger, I find that the polycentric Hanseatic League was not a political authority with the power to tax and regulate its members. The arrangements between the members of the Hanseatic League therefore had to be self-enforcing. Building on my investigation of the Hanseatic League, I further provide a general discussion of the costs and benefits of a central political authority in a system of functional overlapping competing units.

Download the paper from SSRN at the link.

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Law & Humanities Blog

NPR's Three Books: Suggestions For Good Reading Help Clarify Connections Between Law and Society

Posted: 07 Nov 2011 08:26 AM PST

NPR has started a new series, Three Books, in which commentators share a personal story or discuss an issue of interest to them and then recommend three books that carry on the theme. In his essay, NPR's Tony D'Souza reflects on the divergent career paths he and a childhood acquaintance have taken and suggests examining these crime novels for a more nuanced understanding of the interaction of crime and society. More from the NPR series Three Books here, from Bruce Machart, who discusses a friend's encounter with the legal system after a family tragedy, and asks why we gobble up novels about murder, and here, from Lisa Tucker, who talks about Hallowe'en and fall.

Even more Three Books selections here.

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Medical Humanities Blog

Call for Applications: TT Assistant Professor in Medical Humanities and Health Studies

Posted: 04 Nov 2011 07:26 AM PDT

The Program in Medical Humanities and Health Studies at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) seeks a tenure-track assistant professor in Medical Humanities and Health Studies to begin August 2012. Teaching responsibilities include a survey course in medical humanities, and upper-level interdisciplinary courses for a new undergraduate major offered by the program. Some teaching and grant work is expected with Medical School and hospitals on campus.

Doctorate in Medical Humanities or related discipline, plus interdisciplinary teaching experience is strongly preferred. Grant writing experience is desirable. Please send personal statement, curriculum vitae, three current letters of recommendation, and one brief writing sample (chapter or article) by December 7, 2011 to: Medical Humanities Search, Medical Humanities program, Cavanaugh Hall 406, IUPUI, 425 University Blvd., Indianapolis, IN 46202-5140. Candidate interviews to begin after deadline. Nationally renowned for its health and other professional schools as well as community engagement, IUPUI is one of the Midwest's premier urban universities, with more than 30,000 students enrolled on the campus adjacent to downtown Indianapolis. IUPUI is an AA/EOE employer, M/F/D, and encourages applications from women and minority candidates.

_________________________________

This looks like a great opportunity, but I find it particularly interesting that the Call expressly indicates that a "Doctorate in Medical Humanities" is desired. There is, to the best of my knowledge, only one institution in the world that grants a Ph.D in the medical humanities itself (although one other university grants a D.M.H., a Doctor of Medical Humanities). So this is a small pool, although the Call certainly indicates that holders of doctorates in related disciplines are also eligible for the position.

Kudos to IUPUI for expressly opening a TT line for junior interdisciplinary scholars in the health humanities; those kinds of positions are few and far between. (There is one more such position that is open; I will post that Call soon).

(h/t Lit&Med listserv)

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UCL Centre for Digital Humanities

UCLDH contributes to ESF Science Policy Briefing on Digital Infrastructures

Posted: 02 Nov 2011 08:26 AM PDT

UCLDH’s Dr Julianne Nyhan is a joint Author of a new Science Policy Briefing from the European Science Foundation, entitled Research Infrastructures in the Digital Humanities. This report was written by the ESF Working Group on Research Infrastructures in the Humanities under the editorial chairmanship of Professor Claudine Moulin (Trier Center for Digital Humanities, Universität Trier). It also [...]

Medical Humanities Blog

"On the Futility of Screening for Genes that Make You Fat"

Posted: 02 Nov 2011 07:09 AM PDT

J. Lennert Veerman (Univ. Queensland) has a nice commentary out in the latest PLoS Medicine entitled On the Futility of Screening for Genes that Make You Fat. Like all papers in this journal, it is available full-text and open-access. There is no Abstract, but here is an excerpt that sets up the commentary:

There are at least four reasons why screening individuals for genes that predispose to obesity makes little clinical sense and may even do harm. Genetic screening for obesity has limited predictive power, is unlikely to inform therapeutic decisions, does not add to body mass index (BMI) as predictor of disease, and may distract from the societal changes that most experts think are needed to reduce the prevalence of obesity.

The commentary is highly recommended.

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