• ARTICLE Published!

    I published a short article in the British Deaf History Society Journal (15.4), based on the presentation that I gave at the Disability & the Victorians Conference. I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to John A. Hay, Peter Jackson, Jill Jones and Lisa Davies for their support and encouragement. As I discussed in the conference,… Continue Reading

  • Dancing

    A while back me and some of my girlfriends went dancing. At the club, we encountered a group of some of my deaf friends, some who were profoundly deaf and could not hear or speak–but communicated via sign language. All of us went off to the dance floor. The music was, indeed, VERY loud. I’m… Continue Reading

  • William Wright & Miss Hannah Thatcher

    William Wright (1773-1860), whose professional career began in Bristol, England in 1796, moved to London and acquired a large practice in aural surgery that included the Duke of Wellington and other members of the nobility as patients. Eventually he became one of John Harrison Curtis’ fiercest and most outspoken rivals, rallying against the prevalence of… Continue Reading

  • Monday Series: An Inquest into a Surgical Procedure II

    Charles Spradbrow also witnessed Joseph Hall in perfectly good health on Saturday June 22, having had seen him at Turnbull’s ten or twelve times on occasion to be treated for deafness, and was “always very anxious to use the instrument.” Several other individuals—as many as thirty, according to some reports—were also at Turnbull’s that Saturday,… Continue Reading

  • Using an Ear Trumpet

    The other day I was conversing with my friend about what kind of hairstyles I planned to wear for my wedding. I remarked I would probably wear my hair down for the reception, since it will likely coordinate with my outfit. My friend told me I was silly–I should wear my hair up, in some… Continue Reading

  • A Bead and a Thwack

    Surgeon John Abernethy (1764-1831), in his Lectures on Operative Surgery (reprinted in The Lancet vol.8 (1827), 449): Now I remember, not a very great many years ago, that there were paragraphs put into the newspapers, about a child having got something into its ear, which could not be got out. The poor child was in great… Continue Reading

  • The Death of William Whitbread

    Despite the emerging popularity of Eustachian tube catheterization in France—particularly supported with Deleau’s air douche—British aurists remained ambivalent about applying the procedure for deaf patients. In addition to his herbal remedies, Alexander Turnbull performed surgical procedures on his patients, including syringing, removal of obstructions with forceps, and Eustachian tube catheterization. According to aurist William Wright,… Continue Reading

  • The Construction of Norms: Deafness in 17th to 19th Centuries

    The Max Planck Institute for the History of Science has a fantastic project directed by Sabine Arnaud, The Construction of Norms in 17th to 19th Century Europe and the United States. A description of the project: This research group works on deafness and hysteria from the early seventeenth to the late nineteenth century as two sites of conflicting new… Continue Reading

  • REVIEW: “Performing Medicine” by Michael Brown

    Performing Medicine; Medical Culture and Identity in Provincial England, c.1760-1850 (Manchester & New York: Manchester University Press, 2011), 254pp. I get excited when I receive a new book that so wonderfully engages with some of the major themes covered in my dissertation, and even better, a book that nicely contextualizes the background upon which I… Continue Reading