Médecine, folie et maladies mentales dans les études arméniennes

Maladies of the Mind in Armenian Studies Past and Present

Call for Papers

Eleventh Annual International Graduate Student Workshop

April 10-11, 2020

University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
555 Weiser Hall
500 Church Street
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1042

Abstracts are due on November 30, 2019 .

In recent years, the history of medicine, mental illness, and the literary, anthropological, and sociological studies of madness have gained a remarkable momentum internationally. Still, there have been virtually no substantial studies of a premodern and modern understanding of medicine, madness, and maladies of the mind in Armenia and its Diaspora. This interdisciplinary workshop aims to interrogate the stories of both medical and psychiatric sciences as well as that of the concept of madness in Armenian political, historical, literary, and cultural discussions in the past and present.

The workshop will focus on the histories of medicine and psychiatry and the portrayals of madness as a form of behavior, marker of difference, and tool of body politics across periods and geographies. The workshop organizers are interested in the broader history of medicine, but they would like to draw particular attention to the historical and contemporary landscapes in which medical professionals sought to exercise their authorities over mental illnesses and the mind itself. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, tools and theories have provided medical professionals with renewed opportunities to intervene in the social, political and cultural spheres with the shared objective of devising and implementing therapies of madness.

In this, the workshop will initiate an inter-disciplinary conversation about the concept, diagnosis, treatment, and social construction of “madness.” The goal is to consider new perspectives, methodologies and cross-disciplinary frameworks that will put Armenian Studies in conversation with, among others, the growing fields of history of medicine, science and technology studies. In the course of the workshop, the hope is to call into question what was and is culturally defined as madness as well as medical and societal interventions to “cure” madness and “contain” the mad.
Therefore, this meeting will situate the notion of madness at the intersection of politics, medicine, literature, sociology, and anthropology and seeks to explore the changes in its definition and the underpinnings of perceptions of mental illnesses at critical junctures of history in Armenia and amongst its diasporic communities across the globe.

The program is inviting early-career scholars (graduate students or those who defended their dissertations in the last three years) who critically employ concepts of madness and mental illnesses in their work on Armenian history, society, and culture. The aim is to bring together a group of scholars from a broad range of disciplines. These include but are not limited to history, science, medicine and technology studies, psychology, anthropology, literature, political science, gender and sexuality studies, sociology, art history, film studies, and cultural studies. Scholars are invited to submit abstracts in these fields for their proposed papers.

Specific areas of interest include but are not limited to the following:

• Madness and mental illnesses in Armenian history, literature and politics; voices and agencies of the mad in history and politics between the past and present
• Science, medicine and technology studies
• The politicization of madness as identity and experience
• History of psychiatry
• The politics of diagnosis and treatments
• History of medicine
• Representation of madness and mental illnesses in Armenian cinema, art, music, photography, and literature
• Crises of masculinity, nationalism, and identity
• Armenian and global literature on madness
• Construction(s) of social and behavioral normativities in Armenian societies across temporalities and geographies
• Criminalization and policing
• Pathologizing sexualities and gender identities

Please send an abstract (approx. 250 words) along with a CV to asp.grad.workshop@umich.edu by November 30, 2019. Successful applicants will need to submit a paper of no more than 8-10 double-spaced pages by March 25, 2020 to be circulated among workshop participants.

Partial or full funding (for travel and housing expenses) is available for accepted applicants.
Aid will be studied on a case by case basis by the organizing committee.

This workshop, sponsored by the University of Michigan’s Armenian Studies Program and funded by the Alex Manoogian Foundations, is organized by Melanie S. Tanielian, Associate Professor in the History Department and Mano Sakayan, PhD student in the History Department.

For more information and the submission webform, visit our webpage:
https://ii.umich.edu/asp/news-events/all-events/workshops/april-2020--medicine--madness--and-maladies-of-the-mind-in-armen.html