2 options
An organ of murder : crime, violence, and phrenology in nineteenth-century America / Courtney E. Thompson.
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Thompson, Courtney E., author.
- Series:
- Critical issues in health and medicine.
- Critical Issues in Health and Medicine
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Phrenology--United States--History--19th century.
- Phrenology.
- Criminal anthropology--History--19th century.
- Criminal anthropology.
- Criminal psychology--United States--History--19th century.
- Criminal psychology.
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource (279 pages).
- Place of Publication:
- New Brunswick, New Jersey : Rutgers University Press, [2021]
- Summary:
- An Organ of Murder explores the origins of both popular and elite theories of criminality in the nineteenth-century United States, focusing in particular on the influence of phrenology. In the United States, phrenology shaped the production of medico-legal knowledge around crime, the treatment of the criminal within prisons and in public discourse, and sociocultural expectations about the causes of crime. The criminal was phrenology’s ideal research and demonstration subject, and the courtroom and the prison were essential spaces for the staging of scientific expertise. In particular, phrenology constructed ways of looking as well as a language for identifying, understanding, and analyzing criminals and their actions. This work traces the long-lasting influence of phrenological visual culture and language in American culture, law, and medicine, as well as the practical uses of phrenology in courts, prisons, and daily life.
- Contents:
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Introduction: Through a Mirror, Darkly
- Chapter 1 Origins and Organs
- Chapter 2 Transatlantic Societies and Skulls
- Chapter 3 Phrenology on Trial
- Chapter 4 The Prison as Laboratory
- Chapter 5 Policing the Self and the Stranger
- Chapter 6 A Victory for Phrenology?
- Epilogue: Phrenological Futures
- Acknowledgments
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
- About the Author
- Notes:
- Description based on print version record.
- ISBN:
- 1-9788-1310-4
- OCLC:
- 1223058309
The Penn Libraries is committed to describing library materials using current, accurate, and responsible language. If you discover outdated or inaccurate language, please fill out this feedback form to report it and suggest alternative language.