Embodying Suicidal Emotions in England, 1700-1860
The ‘drooping of despondency’, Ella Sbaraini analyses a variety of source material to explore how the embodied nature of suicidal feelings in the past
The Perils and Possibilities of Retrospective Diagnosis
Anna Jamieson explores researchers’ urge to retrospectively diagnose historical and literary figures, outlining the dangers and possibilities of such diagnostic endeavours.
“Nostalgia for the Future”: Projecting a Post-Disability Image through Retro-Futuristic Aesthetics in Viktoria Modesta’s “Prototype”
In her paper, presented at the online Cyberpunk Culture 2020 conference (the recording is available here), Julia Gatermann explores the re-signification of disability via cyberpunk aesthetics and posthumanism in Viktoria Modesta’s art. Self-labeled bionic
‘Making Bodies Kosher’: Book Review
Michal Raucher reviews Ben Kasstan’s Making Bodies Kosher: The Politics of Reproduction among Haredi Jews in England (Berghahn: 2019). In Making Bodies Kosher, Ben Kasstan explores the ways Orthodox Jews in Manchester, England respond to public
Lockdown theatre: Crips without Constraints
With the news that theatres are making slow steps towards re-opening, this week I am looking back to another digital performance based project that has been running during lockdown. Throughout lockdown Graeae theatre company
‘Moving Worlds’: Journal Issue Review
Neko Mellor reviews Moving World’s latest issue, ‘Literature, Medicine, Health’ (edited by Clare Barker). At the time of writing this review, the UK is in its seventh week of lockdown due to the covid-19 pandemic, and
What is Sub-Optimal Health?
Lijiaozi Cheng discusses the concept of sub-optimal health and the Chinese government’s colour-based “health code” for containing COVID-19 A label for me A few years ago, I was doing my masters in Edinburgh and
(Not) Looking at Historical Medical Images
How do researchers respond to the politics, ethics and emotions raised by archival medical images? Michaela Clark reviews the workshop ‘Emotions and Ethics: the Use and Abuse of Historical Images’, organised by AboutFace, 17 June 2020.
Muzzles, parrots and lifejackets: the uneasy objectification of the face mask
As lockdown eases and face coverings become mandatory in certain situations, Harriet Barratt uses object relations theory to consider the emotional responses that the mask engenders.
The Gendered Spectacle of Suffering
Lucy Weir explores the gendered nature of critical responses to on-stage violence I am an art historian by training, though my expertise lies in performance, from dance and theatre to live art. Throughout my