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Building Networks in Tropical Medicine

in Networks in Tropical Medicine: Internationalism, Colonialism, and the Rise of a Medical Specialty, 1890–1930

This chapter explores the emergence of tropical medicine within the context of European colonial expansion and discusses how scientists took advantage of their proximity to like-minded colleagues in ... More

This chapter explores the emergence of tropical medicine within the context of European colonial expansion and discusses how scientists took advantage of their proximity to like-minded colleagues in neighboring countries to further their research and expand their discipline's reach.Less

Creating the Cadre: Teachers, Students, and the Culture of Tropical Medicine

in Networks in Tropical Medicine: Internationalism, Colonialism, and the Rise of a Medical Specialty, 1890–1930

This chapter focuses on the teachers, students, and culture of tropical medicine. It demonstrates how broad-based values as well as specialized knowledge united teacher and student, and argues that ... More

This chapter focuses on the teachers, students, and culture of tropical medicine. It demonstrates how broad-based values as well as specialized knowledge united teacher and student, and argues that students' European training and their fieldwork allowed for social conditioning, reinforcing certain ideas and practices and creating an in-group mentality that enhanced a shared view of science and colonialism.Less

Disease and Colonial Enclaves

in Contagion and Enclaves: Tropical Medicine in Colonial India

From the eighteenth to the twentieth century, the practices of colonialism in the tropical world were informed by the epistemologies and therapeutics of Western science and medicine. In their ... More

From the eighteenth to the twentieth century, the practices of colonialism in the tropical world were informed by the epistemologies and therapeutics of Western science and medicine. In their conquest and colonisation of the non-European territories, Europe imbued its practices of settlement with the dread of ‘tropical diseases’. This book situates the history of tropical medicine within the political and economic contexts of colonialism. In particular, it explores the relationship between tropical medicine, the colonial state, and colonial enclaves in India by focusing on two enclaves in north Bengal: the hill-station of Darjeeling and the adjacent tea plantations. The chapter argues that the plantations and sanatoriums of the Darjeeling hill-station were coterminous enclaves, in part due to factors such as political economy, geographical proximity, and similarities in colonisation processes and colonial investments.Less

Tropical Medicine in Its ‘Field’: Malaria, Hookworm and the Rhetoric of the ‘Local’

in Contagion and Enclaves: Tropical Medicine in Colonial India

This chapter explores the dynamics between colonial enclaves and tropical medicine in twentieth-century India. Although British Indian medical discourse and practice accepted germ theory, miasmatic ... More

This chapter explores the dynamics between colonial enclaves and tropical medicine in twentieth-century India. Although British Indian medical discourse and practice accepted germ theory, miasmatic and climatic theories of disease were never abandoned. In colonial India, tropical diseases remained tied to specific ‘zones’ and ‘localities’. The tea plantations were an important site for the exploration of new ideas and experimentation designed to control malaria and other archetypical ‘tropical’ disease in India in general and Bengal in particular. The chapter first provides an overview of malaria in the Darjeeling foothills before turning to the issue of acquired immunity to malarial fever through racial acclimatisation. It also discusses the debate between prevention and prophylaxis in the military cantonment called Mian Mir, the anti-malarial operation at Meenglas Tea Estate in the Duars, the relationship between tropical medicine and entrepreneurial patronage, and research on hookworm in the tea plantations.Less

The Historical Origins of Modern International (and Global) Health

Anne-Emanuelle Birn, Yogan Pillay, and Timothy H. Holtz

in Textbook of Global Health

This chapter explores historical antecedents of and influences on modern international (and global) health, including plague pandemics, European imperialism, colonial conquest, the Atlantic slave ... More

This chapter explores historical antecedents of and influences on modern international (and global) health, including plague pandemics, European imperialism, colonial conquest, the Atlantic slave trade, and the Industrial Revolution. It examines ideologies and practices of colonial health and tropical medicine, disease problems exacerbated by imperialism (malaria, yellow fever, and trypanosomiasis), and how scientific research and public health measures implemented in American, African, and Asian colonies were justified by missionary and “civilizing” rationales and by protecting imperial military and commercial interests. It traces the impact of 19th century industrialization on health, work, and living conditions, and the rise of bacteriologically-based public health, spanning imperialism and industrialization. It analyzes how sanitary concerns—combined with trade, migration, economic, and security imperatives—motivated international sanitary cooperation and institutions, initially in the Americas. It reviews Rockefeller Foundation-pioneered donor-driven technical approaches, and the interwar League of Nations Health Organisation’s embrace of more aspirational social medicine approaches.Less

International Public Health and Caribbean Child-Saving

Juanita De Barros

in Reproducing the British Caribbean: Sex, Gender, and Population Politics after Slavery

This chapter examines the influence of the ideas and institutions of tropical medicine on perceptions of Caribbean populations, at a time when migration and tropical diseases were considered ... More

This chapter examines the influence of the ideas and institutions of tropical medicine on perceptions of Caribbean populations, at a time when migration and tropical diseases were considered obstacles to population growth. Imperial and colonial officials, together with members of the multiethnic West Indian middle and professional classes, believed that the main solutions to shrinking and weakened populations were to increase immigration and eradicate diseases. Concerns about venereal diseases, infant mortality, and the moral calculations about the value of children's lives led to a variety of public health initiatives. However, many Caribbean men and women saw child-saving as an economic and a moral imperative that had major implications for their reputation as civilized people.Less

Setting the scene (largely from the UK point of view)

John Pemberton

in The Development of Modern Epidemiology: Personal reports from those who were there

This chapter begins recollections of how epidemiology was perceived in the 1930s. It then discusses the concept of social medicine in relation to clinical medicine, politics, and war as well as the ... More

This chapter begins recollections of how epidemiology was perceived in the 1930s. It then discusses the concept of social medicine in relation to clinical medicine, politics, and war as well as the acceptance of social medicine as part of physicians' training. The establishment of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and origins and contribution to epidemiology of the International Epidemiological Association are discussed.Less

The Black Vomit and the Provincial Press:: The Campaigns in the West Indies

Erica Charters

in Disease, War, and the Imperial State: The Welfare of the British Armed Forces during the Seven Years' War

This chapter examines the role of disease and responses thereto during the 1759 campaigns against French-held Martinique and Guadeloupe and the 1762 campaign against Spanish-held Cuba. Contextualized ... More

This chapter examines the role of disease and responses thereto during the 1759 campaigns against French-held Martinique and Guadeloupe and the 1762 campaign against Spanish-held Cuba. Contextualized by contemporary and modern medical understanding of tropical disease, this chapter shows that officials were aware of the dangers of disease in the West Indian climate and followed the advice of medical authorities concerning hot climates. Yet little could be done to prevent high rates of morbidity and mortality, particularly as a result of yellow fever. This serves as a reminder that rates of disease are not always an accurate way to assess medical care and adaptation to foreign environments, whether physical or cultural. The chapter concludes with an examination of the reports of disease in colonial American newspapers, tracing the role that disease played in the emerging colonial public sphere and its nascent imperial frustrations. In the broader context of imperial-colonial relations, disease in West Indian campaigns demonstrates the difficulties of colonial warfare and its potential for straining relations between Britain and its colonies.Less

A Legacy of Embitterment: World War I and Its Impact on Transnational Tropical Medicine

in Networks in Tropical Medicine: Internationalism, Colonialism, and the Rise of a Medical Specialty, 1890–1930

This chapter explores some aspects of the changed relationship between France, Britain, and Germany after 1918 and how it affected transnational tropical medicine. It focuses on sleeping sickness in ... More

This chapter explores some aspects of the changed relationship between France, Britain, and Germany after 1918 and how it affected transnational tropical medicine. It focuses on sleeping sickness in Africa, as the problem of the disease intensified in the wake of the war and remained a major issue for tropical medicine researchers and doctors in the post-war period.Less

Introduction

Juanita De Barros

in Reproducing the British Caribbean: Sex, Gender, and Population Politics after Slavery

This book investigates ideas and policymaking about reproduction and the size and health of populations in Britain's Caribbean colonies both before and immediately after the end of slavery, a period ... More

This book investigates ideas and policymaking about reproduction and the size and health of populations in Britain's Caribbean colonies both before and immediately after the end of slavery, a period spanning the early nineteenth century to the 1930s. The focus is on Jamaica, Barbados, and Guyana, and on maternal education and infant welfare initiatives introduced by colonial policymakers, including midwife training programs. The book considers the debates about population growth in these three colonies, as well as the problem of infant mortality. It also examines how the ideas and institutions of tropical medicine influenced perceptions of Caribbean populations.Less

Conclusion

in Networks in Tropical Medicine: Internationalism, Colonialism, and the Rise of a Medical Specialty, 1890–1930

This book explores tropical medicine as an inter-European international science and assesses the application of some of its leading scientists' ideas about how to address two major colonial health ... More

This book explores tropical medicine as an inter-European international science and assesses the application of some of its leading scientists' ideas about how to address two major colonial health problems in Africa: public health in urban colonial centers and the sleeping sickness epidemic. It focuses on a group of colonizers: what motivated them, what brought them together as a transnational community, how the colonies benefited their profession, and how their collective ideas were put into practice in specific locations.Less

Introduction

in Networks in Tropical Medicine: Internationalism, Colonialism, and the Rise of a Medical Specialty, 1890–1930

This book argues that European tropical medicine experts successfully built a network of professional researchers and clinicians that helped them establish their collective authority as experts in a ... More

This book argues that European tropical medicine experts successfully built a network of professional researchers and clinicians that helped them establish their collective authority as experts in a new field of scientific inquiry. It examines the facilitation of certain kinds of medical advances and their contribution to colonial practices in Europe's African colonies. The book demonstrates that colonial health practices developed as a result both of national goals and of interventions by influential transnational actors with shared agendas.Less

British Prestige and Fears of Colonial Degeneration

Satoshi Mizutani

in The Meaning of White: Race, Class, and the 'Domiciled Community' in British India 1858-1930

This chapter discusses the ‘imperial politics of whiteness’ in relation to both the politico-economic characteristics of British rule and the life-worlds of white bourgeois families. These two were ... More

This chapter discusses the ‘imperial politics of whiteness’ in relation to both the politico-economic characteristics of British rule and the life-worlds of white bourgeois families. These two were mutually inseparable because the quotidian lives of Britons—how, where, and with whom they lived, as well as how and where they reared their children—were of central importance to the definition and social reproduction of British racial prestige, upon which the legitimacy of the Raj ultimately depended. Among the most important sources for the discussions here are the Reports of the Select Committee on Colonization and Settlement (1858–59), which contain official debates on these questions. A range of journal and newspaper articles, as well as medical books and manuals, are also examined.Less

Colonial medicine and folk beliefs in the modern era

Stephen Snelders

in Leprosy and Colonialism: Suriname Under Dutch Rule, 1750-1950

The on-going adherence of the Afro-Surinamese and of new British Indian and Javanese migrants to their own folk beliefs and practices necessitated a response from Dutch colonial medicine. If modern ... More

The on-going adherence of the Afro-Surinamese and of new British Indian and Javanese migrants to their own folk beliefs and practices necessitated a response from Dutch colonial medicine. If modern leprosy politics were to succeed, some degree of cooperation and compliance from the population was necessary. Folk beliefs were not seen as a possible alternative to Western science and medicine on a conceptual level; however, Dutch colonial medicine found elements in folk beliefs useful for its own health propaganda and communication, while at the same time emphatically rejecting the folk medicine practitioners’ worldview underlying these beliefs. In this sense Dutch colonial medicine did not limit itself to the interventions from above based on biomedical knowledge that historians have found typical of ‘Imperial Tropical Medicine’, but actively sought the compliance of the population.Less

Turning Tropical

Michitake Aso

in Rubber and the Making of Vietnam: An Ecological History, 1897-1975

Rubber plantations necessitated extensive medical studies of human biology and diseases. Researchers at the Pasteur Institute carried out numerous studies of mosquitoes and plasmodia, and to a lesser ... More

Rubber plantations necessitated extensive medical studies of human biology and diseases. Researchers at the Pasteur Institute carried out numerous studies of mosquitoes and plasmodia, and to a lesser extent other pathogens, among plantation workers. Race served as an important analytic category for these researchers even as anthropologists were beginning to question the coherence of racial categories. Chapter 4 investigates the racialized society that the architects of industrial agriculture imagined they were creating. It also discusses the interactions in Indochina between the burgeoning tropical sciences and government and transnational capital, focusing on human disease environments to examine how “rubber science” was applied to the surrounding countryside. If plantations were microcosms of the global colonial society, they were also laboratories where solutions to colonial problems were worked out. Tropical agronomy, geography, and medicine, linked by an ecological view of climates and soils, helped naturalize racial distinctions for the colonizers. Yet the colonial subjects who were the targets of these projects did not act in ways that race makers expected. While these subjects could not control the discourse of race, they could appropriate it for their own ends, and they attempted to do so before the outbreak of World War II.Less