From patronage to biotech: new perspectives on medicine and commerce
24th International Congress of History of Science, Technology and Medicine
25 Juillet 2013
Université de Manchester, UK
Symposium organisers:
Stine Slot Grumsen | Aarhus University, Denmark
James Stark | University of Leeds, United Kingdom
This symposium aims to shed new light on the shifting relationships between medicine, medical practice and commerce in the modern period. Following Roy Porter, historical narratives of the medical marketplace have largely concentrated on the emergence of the medical trade in the early modern period. Yet, commercial activity centred on medicine increased dramatically during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and set a precedent for the current climate. Worldwide markets for medical products and doctors’ services continue to expand as a result of such developments, controversially in some cases. We therefore seek to redress this imbalance in the historical literature by exploring three broad themes from the seventeenth to the late-twentieth century:
The importance of loci or spaces of conjunction between medicine and commerce, from the Medici Court to dental journals, from newspapers to biotech laboratories;
The impact of the relationship between medicine and commerce on the work of historical actors, considering intermediaries such as manufacturers, retailers and advertisers in addition to doctors and patients;
The exchange and transformation of knowledge, materials and practices between those connected with the healthcare industry broadly construed.
Across all papers, the deployment of knowledge, skills and practices is central. Medical and technical knowledge was put to work designing and making new products, and practitioners who became involved in such activities saw the lines of their own work become blurred; their interests became divided between professional and business domains. Knowledge acted in a transformative way, and was itself transformed; theoretical innovations in medicine impacted on the tools, techniques and therapies associated with healthcare and medical treatments, and vice versa. Further, medical knowledge was used in new and surprising ways to sell products to a broad range of consumers. This symposium offers an opportunity for historians to reflect on the medicine-commerce nexus, and to initiate new lines of enquiry into this important emerging area of scholarship.
Thu 25 July, early morning
Thu 25 July, late morning
Symposium abstract
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