The Certification of Insanity : Local Origins and Imperial Consequences / / by Filippo Maria Sposini

• Autore: Sposini Filippo Maria
• Pubblicazione: Cham : , : Palgrave Macmillan, , 2023; ©2023
• Edizione: 1st ed.
• Descrizione fisica: 1 online resource (338 pages)
• Soggetto topico: Science - History; Medicine - History; Psychology; Social sciences - History; Imperialism
• Soggetto geografico: Great Britain History
• Nota di contenuto: Intro -- Acknowledgements -- Contents -- List of Figures -- 1 Introduction -- Madness, Power, and Empire -- The Certification of Lunacy Around the World -- Local Origins and Imperial Consequences -- 2 The Medical Certificate: A Technology of Inspection, Identification, and Expertise -- Introduction -- Technologies of Fact-Finding -- Under the Hands and Seals -- Skilled Observers -- Conclusions -- 3 Upon the Following Grounds: The Victorian System of Certification -- Introduction -- Liberty, Trade, and Privacy -- Regulating Medical Power -- Proofs on Paper -- Conclusions -- 4 Building Expert Certifiers: The Rise of Psychological Physicians -- Introduction -- Expertise and Certification -- The Risk of Certifying -- Instructing Certifiers -- Conclusions -- 5 Facts of Insanity Around the World: Towards an Imperial History of Lunacy Certificates -- Introduction -- Charting an Imperial Phenomenon -- An Imperial Technology -- Bringing Facts to the Pacific -- Conclusions -- 6 A Choreography of Consensus: The Use of Hybrid Templates in Ontario -- Introduction -- The Rise of Form K -- The Art of Certifying -- Are Three Better Than Two? -- Conclusions -- 7 Epilogue -- Appendices -- Appendix A: Major Legislation in the Age of Government Growth, England and Wales, 1773-1933 -- Appendix B: Certification in English Law, 1344-1914 -- Appendix C: Medical Certification in English Law, 1695-1913 -- Appendix D: Statutory Requirements for Civil Confinement in England and Wales, 1713-1890 -- Appendix E: Chronological Diffusion of the Victorian System of Certification -- Appendix F: Geographical Diffusion of the Victorian System of Certification -- References -- Index.
• Sommario/riassunto: This book represents the first systematic study of the certification of lunacy in the British Empire. Considering a variety of legal, archival, and published sources, it traces the origins and dissemination of a peculiar method for determining mental unsoundness defined as the 'Victorian system'. Shaped by the dynamics surrounding the clandestine committal of wealthy Londoners in private madhouses, this system featured three distinctive tenets: standardized forms, independent medical examinations, and written facts of insanity. Despite their complexity, Victorian certificates achieved a remarkable success. Not only did they survive in the UK for more than a century, but they also served as a model for the development of mental health laws around the world. By the start of the Second World War, more than seventy colonial and non-colonial jurisdictions adopted the Victorian formula for making lunacy official with some countries still relying on it to this very day. Using case studies from Europe, the Americas, and the Pacific, this book charts the temporal and geographical trajectory of an imperial technology used to determine a person's destiny. Shifting the focus from metropolitan policies to colonial dynamics, and from macro developments to micro histories, it explores the perspectives of families, doctors, and public officials as they began to deal with the delicate business of certification. This book will be of interest to scholars working on mental health policy, the history of medicine, disability studies, and the British Empire. Filippo Maria Sposini is a researcher interested in the global history of madness, medicine, and law. He has published on the history of deviance in social sciences, the emergence of confinement procedures in Canada, and the production of psychiatric expertise in Victorian Britain. Previously, he studied at the University of Toronto in Canada and trained as a psychologist in Italy.
• Titolo autorizzato: The Certification of Insanity
• ISBN: 9783031427428; 3-031-42742-4
• Formato: Materiale a stampa
• Livello bibliografico: Monografia
• Lingua di pubblicazione: Inglese
• Record Nr.: 9910767575403321
• Lo trovi qui: Univ. Federico II
• Serie: Mental Health in Historical Perspective Series