Happy New Year from Medicine and the Making of Race!
We hope you had a restful winter break. 2023 was a brilliant year for the project, with many enjoyable and productive research trips and collaborative events. Look back on our summer and autumn updates to read all about our year. We have a number of confirmed events for the year ahead, and more that we’re excited about developing, so keep an eye out on our website. First up in February, we’re reading Thomas Browne’s work on skin colour, with Prof Kevin Killeen (more info here). In March, we’re excited to welcome Urvashi Chakravarty to reflect on the progress of her already-seminal work, Fictions of Consent, as it appears in paperback – more details soon! Also look out for MMoR sessions at RSA that month, which continue some of the conversations of Eli’s generative conference, on Christianity and Racemaking.
As this lineup might suggest, our work has taken unexpected turns – geographically and historiographically. We thought we’d kick off the new year by sharing some reading recommendations from the MMoR community, to celebrate our broad range of research foci and the people who were such a huge part in making the past year so successful and stimulating. We asked participants from 2023 events to suggest one piece of reading they had found interesting or unexpected over the course of year. Here are some of their picks – we hope this inspires some of your own reading in the year ahead.
Amalia Levi, who took part in our July Summer School (read her brilliant summary of the week here), recommends Elise Mitchell's "Morbid Crossings: Surviving Smallpox, Maritime Quarantine, and the Gendered Geography of the Early Eighteenth-Century Intra-Caribbean Slave Trade". Amalia comments ‘It does a great job focusing on, going beyond, and interrogating the gaps and fragmentation of sources; blends together masterfully many micro-histories along one person's life over a vast geographical area; and approaches compassionately and respectfully an enslaved woman's experiences.’ This article was a standout for other members too and Elise, who participated in one of our 2022 workshops on Slavery, Medicine and Race-making, has had a ridiculously prolific year. Check out some of her other recent publications here.
Zack Dorner, who contributed to our autumn blog series (read his blog ‘Ordering Medicines and Ordering People on Caribbean Plantations’ here), recommends Kate Luce Mulry’s “Climate and Reproduction in the Early English Atlantic,” Early Modern Women 18, no. 1 (Fall 2023): 118-132. Zack writes ‘This piece prompted me to consider new aspects of the English discourse on climate and bodily change. It places women's reproductive labour (and, really, their "reproductive exploitation") at the centre of seventeenth-century debates about climate, demography, and race-making. Additionally, I've found it quite useful for teaching!’ Zack’s 2020 monograph, Merchants of Medicine, is – incidentally – one we revisited for upcoming work on “African pharmacology”.
Adam Sutcliffe, who contributed to our Politics of Pity reading group in November, says his most powerful read this year was Svetlana Alexievich’s ‘Second-Hand Time’. Adam comments ‘Through a multiplicity of interwoven personal testimonies, she conveyed extraordinarily the ravaged history of Russia from the Soviet period until the recent past.’
Matthew Francis Rarey, who participated in our April ‘Bundles: Empowered Packets in the Early Modern Atlantic World’ workshop, recommends Frederick Douglass' 1866 essay "Reconstruction” which was re-published with annotations in The Atlantic last month. Matthew writes ‘It's a careful, impassioned, and prescient warning; Douglass sees the possibility of the country he, and I, should live in, but which remains in construction over 150 years since Douglass wrote.’ Matthew’s very beautiful book cropped back up in discussions at our Christianity and Racemaking conference!
Benedetta Chizzolini, participant in our June Slavery, Race and Health in the Global Mediterranean workshop and future blog contributor, recommends Kenneth Borris and George Rousseau, eds. “The Sciences of Homosexuality in Early Modern Europe”. New York: Routledge, 2008. Benedetta writes ‘Not related to slavery… but without any doubt, this is the book that I found most stimulating this year. As Borris points out, it is actually possible to speak of an attempt to “medicalize” homosexuality as early as the 12th century, if not even earlier by the Greeks and Romans. In particular, Borris’ proposal is to reject the “acts paradigm” basis for the traditional dichotomous interpretation of same-sex relationships. According to this paradigm, before modernity one can’t speak of “homosexuality” but only of “sodomy”, based on the idea that the only possible conceptualization concerned the “act” of sodomy itself, and not the “being” (i.e. the nature) of the sodomite. “Before the modern era sexual deviance could only be predicated upon acts, not on persons or identities.” On the contrary, “same-sex oriented characters, dispositions, subjectivities, and modes of identity existed in the sixteenth century and much earlier centuries.”’.
Teresa Göltl who contributed to our autumn blog series with her piece ‘Medical Practitioners and the Former French Colonies: “Antagonists of the Colonial System”?’ recommends Trevor Burnard and Sophie White's edited volume, "Hearing Enslaved Voices: African and Indian Slave Testimony in British and French America, 1700-1848". Teresa comments ‘From the onset of my PhD journey, Trevor Burnard and Sophie White's edited volume has profoundly inspired me. This diverse collection of articles challenges the dominance of autobiographical slave narratives, illustrating that by broadening this genre, we are able to uncover new avenues to amplify the voices of the enslaved. Specifically, Dominique Rogers' contribution regarding Slave Judiciary Testimonies in the French Caribbean - What do to with them? significantly shaped my approach to reading and interpreting judicial sources in the (colonial) archive(s). She advocates that testimonies of the enslaved possess the potential to act as "major tools in helping the reconstruction" of Caribbean societies still burdened by the colonial past. During my research stay in Guadeloupe this year, I discovered that these testimonies are already being utilized as "tools", notably by Guadeloupean writes like Gilda Gonfier, who crafted a play based on these records. As such, I would like to recommend "Le cachot" by Gilda Gonfier as she not only gives a voice to the enslaved but she demonstrates that there are ways to transcend the past in order to heal, reconcile, and forge a better future.’
And finally Sarah-Maria Schober, author of the October blog ‘Chained: Civet Cats and Slavery’, recommends "Afro-Dog: Blackness and the Animal Question“ by Bénédicte Boisseron (2018). Sarah comments that ‘The book was suggested to me at a conference in York this summer on the commodification of animals in the context of Empire - and inspired my subsequent writing across projects (also for the MMoR blog). It’s a highly sensitive book that focuses on the intersection of racism and speciesism in a multifaceted way, with many interesting examples but also rich in theory. The historical focus is on the 20th century, but it also speaks to very timely 21st century problems, and occasionally reaches back to earlier times (on Bentham or slavery for example).’ Hannah and Sarah are speaking together in a joint session on Racemaking and Early Modern Germany at the German Historical Institute in May, so do come if you can, to see how this reading illuminates new research.
A huge thank you to all who sent their recommendations. We are excited for the year ahead and look forward to collaborating with our research community in 2024. Keep an eye out for future project events on our website’s Events page. Wishing you all a happy and prosperous year!
The MMoR team