Call for contributions (ESHHS, 2019): historical perspectives on mental capacities and psychological traits
Call for contributions: European Society for the History of the Human Sciences, 4-6 July 2019, Budapest.
Panel: Giftedness and feebleness under scrutiny: historical perspectives
on the examination of mental capacities and psychological traits
The sessions seeks to
understand how and why humans were classified into certain psychological
categories such as “mentally abnormal”, “gifted”, “feeble” etc.
Physicians, psychologists and pedagogues designed techniques
to register psychological differences among schoolchildren and (young)
adults to rank and classify them. This was done for several reasons,
often to undertake groupings and to guide their education and
professional training while adducing reasons of mental
hygiene, eugenics, industrial and educational efficiency.
In this context the concept
of “abnormality”, be this feebleness or giftedness, gained prominence.
Although there was no scholarly agreement on how to define these terms,
there was a consensus on why it was important:
the feeble should be under surveillance while gifted children would
require attention to foster the full development of their capacities.
Thus, conceptions of feebleness and giftedness affected education and
parenting.
Historical research has yet
to explain what was the social role acquired by each concept and
classification system at certain place and time and why mental
abnormality (feebleness, giftedness or any other mental or
personal trait) had acquired such a role within Western society during
the last decades of the 19th and early 20th century.
We welcome presentations
from the fields of the history of psychology, medicine or pedagogy
dealing with topics such as mental testing, education for the feeble or
the gifted, child prodigies, biotypologies, psychotechniques
and professional guidance, and related areas.
If you are interested in joining the panel please contact Annette Mülberger (Annette.Mulberger@uab.cat)
and Andrea Graus (andrea.graus@uantwerpen.be) before March 3.