CFP: Working Across Species: Comparative Practices in Modern Medical, Biological and Behavioural Sciences
Location: King’s College London, London
Date: 7-8 January 2016
Comparison is one of the foundations of modern medicine,
biology and behavioural science. Particularly since the 18th century, thinking
and working comparatively has been crucial to fields as wide-ranging as
pathology, physiology, microbiology, pharmacy, epidemiology, veterinary science
ethology, evolutionary biology,
psychology and anthropology;. It has informed practices as varied as
natural history, taxonomy, nosology, diagnostics, and experimentation; the
production of knowledge of life, health, disease, behaviour, emotion, and
cognition; the making, testing and use of therapies; the organization of
hospitals, museums, laboratories, field stations, farms, asylums, and industry;
and to the training and routines of practitioners and researchers.
This workshop will explore a crucial aspect of the
history of comparison in modern medicine, biology and behavioural science:
thinking and working between humans and animals. Organized with the support of
Wellcome Trust, it will investigate how different fields, institutions,
experts, and epistemologies developed, deployed and depended upon comparative
reasoning and practices across species. What has it meant to ‘compare’ in this
way? What methods have counted as ‘comparative’? On what kinds of techniques and
materials have they relied? How, where, and by whom has comparative knowledge
been produced? How did it gain legitimacy and how was it contested? To what
extent, and in what ways, did working comparatively between species involve
collaboration between different disciplines, specialisms or institutions? How
have comparative medicine, biology and behavioural science produced, reproduced
or challenged categories of class, race, gender, and sexuality? And in what
ways have they contributed to ideas of the ‘human’ and the ‘animal’, and
constructed or broken down boundaries between them?
We welcome short proposals on topics related but not
limited to these questions. The workshop aims to be broadly interdisciplinary,
drawing together researchers and approaches from history, anthropology,
sociology, philosophy and related fields.
Deadline for proposals: 17 April 2015
Format: Accepted papers will be pre-circulated 4 weeks in
advance of the meeting. Commentators will be invited to introduce and discuss a
paper, with each author responding to commentary and questions.
Proposals should include: a title, author(s) affiliation,
and an abstract of no longer than 300 words. They should be submitted
electronically as a Word or RTF document to:
c/o Dr. Michael Bresalier
Department of History
King's College London
Strand
London WC2R 2LS