Katharine Cheston discusses the isolation, disbelief and stigma experienced by people with poorly understood medical conditions Autobiographical accounts of illness tend to follow a similar script. Typically, they open with an interruption: new symptoms
David Ellis reflects on ADHD and the language – and judgements – around it. ‘But you said for me to write a couple of lines’, I protest as the teacher ushers me out of
What do objects from a bygone age tell us about epidemics today? Since opening in June, the exhibition Contagious! reflects on the history of pandemics, including patients’ painful experiences, coping and containment strategies, and examples of ground-breaking medical research. Ruben Verwaal reports on his recent visit.
Being a patient today increasingly means being an image. Liz Orton’s new artist’s book, Every Body is an Archive, takes the medical image as a site of critical enquiry to explore questions of ownership, language and power within the clinical encounter. Polyphony editor Fiona Johnstone met with Liz Orton to talk about the book, the centrality of image-making to medical practice, and how right now is a radical moment for the clinical gaze.
Karen Rushton, Borough Archivist at Valence House Museum London, introduces the Wellcome Trust funded “Building Becontree” project, reflecting on the estate’s history and significance at the time of today’s global pandemic and the relevance
Laura Donald reflects on invisible health conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic. I live in a Glasgow tenement building whose inhabitants pride themselves on their neighbourliness. Often I mute the residents’ WhatsApp group, sometimes for
As part of her ongoing research, Dr Sara Louise Wheeler places Frozen’s protagonist Elsa in context of historical and contemporary depictions of those living with genetic conditions which cause depigmentation and deafness. Historically, hegemonic
In this personal essay Cleo Hanaway-Oakley reflects on being pregnant during the pandemic and the importance of ultrasound scan imagery.
The ‘drooping of despondency’, Ella Sbaraini analyses a variety of source material to explore how the embodied nature of suicidal feelings in the past
Anna Jamieson explores researchers’ urge to retrospectively diagnose historical and literary figures, outlining the dangers and possibilities of such diagnostic endeavours.
