Public talk by historian Chris Millard, 4 December 6–8pm, Keynes Library, Birkbeck University of London, 43 Gordon Square, London
Does it matter if a scholar has ‘personal experience’ of the topic they study?
How might a historian of Munchausen Syndrome or Munchausen by Proxy relate in print to a childhood that includes those things?
In this meeting, Chris Millard will draw upon his important new (Open Access) book on the Munchausen syndromes to think about the ways our emotional investments and past experiences shape our historical research. Drawing upon his own life and his historical scholarship, he will work through the examples of Munchausen Syndrome (faking illness) and Munchausen by Proxy (faking or inducing illness in a dependent) to open up a new critical perspective on the writing of psychiatric history.
Academics often try to cultivate an image of neutrality, adopting a style that somehow obscures their personal experience. Yet this experience still emerges – in prefaces, afterwords and epilogues, in questions after a scholarly paper, in the coffee breaks in conferences or at post-seminar drinks. It is the subject of gossip, speculation, and insider knowledge. In history especially it is often woefully under-theorised and only rarely the subject of critical or self-conscious reflection.
The notion of ‘lived experience’ is increasingly part of various knowledge claims in the twenty-first century, entangled with questions of authenticity, who has the right to speak, and on behalf of which group. The opportunities and costs of this disclosure are not evenly distributed across those marked and unmarked by various kinds of marginalisation, in scholarship or wider society.
Chris will speak about the book, exploring the politics of this disclosure in academic history, followed by a conversation with other scholars in different disciplines (Felicity Callard, Louise Hide and Evan Sedgwick-Jell), who have wrestled from different angles with the politics of their own experiences and their scholarship.
6-6:30pm: Talk by Chris Millard – Historian of Self Harm, Child Abuse and Concepts of Personal Experience
6:30-7:15pm: Responses:
Felicity Callard, Human Geographer of Psychiatric Categories and Long Covid (6:30-6:45)
Louise Hide, Historian of Asylums, Care Homes, and Institutional Scandal (6:45-7:00)
Evan Sedgwick-Jell, Cultural Theorist, Historian of Psychology and Psychoanalysis (7:00-7:15)
7:15-8pm: Questions and discussion.
Reception to follow
Attendance is free, but please sign up via this Eventbrite booking page. This event is sponsored by Birkbeck University of London, Queen Mary University of London, and the journal History of the Human Sciences.