Madness and Civilization
Jan 15, 2016
Madness and Civilization
Chapter 1 Stultifera Navis
Challenge to historiography Did such ships exist? Significance to argument of
text?
Bosch - The Ship of Fools
Bicetre
Chapter 2: The Great Confinement
Meaning of madness, treatment of mad shifts.
Madness is related to idleness. Thus, madness becomes an
economic and moral issue. Thus it requires punishment.Punishment is informed by
opportunities for economic exploitation/advantage, moral condemnation, and religious ideas (the mad are cast as the Fallen)
Introduction of morality via economic issues has lasting affects on treatment of mad and the relationship between mad and society.
Classical Period Begins
Salpetriere
Chapter 3: The Insane
Enclosing of people mirrors enclosure of land
Mad lack what is most human to classical mind – reason
Thus can be treated as animals
Chapter 4: Passion and Delirium
M. Foucault
The mad often demonstrate unique use of language and logic which has the potential to:test boundaries of language and logic.distort language and logic in unique ways. express its own unique logic and truth.
Madness, logic, and language.
Chapter 5: Aspects of Madness
Transition from moral to medical
Humors and common sense
Immersion
Chapter 6: Doctors and Patients
Nonetheless, new approach is still rooted in religious notions of punishment and redemption. Cure focuses on the bodies of the mad. Water cure recalls baptism.Other cures: deliberately inflected skin disease, bleedings, baths, and purges, theatrical representation.
Shift towards more humane, scientific approach to treatment.
Marquis De Sade
Chapter 7: The Great Fear
Foucault returns to literary analysis
18th Century fear of contamination
Diderot, DeSade, Holderlin, Nerval, Nietzsche
Goya – “The Sleep of Reason
Chapter 8: The New Division
Physicians, theorists proposeconfinement be reduced to those who
are a danger to themselves and society.relocation of patients from jails to
hospitalsHowever, hospitals to treat the mad do
not yet exist.
Early 19th century, calls for reforms.
Chapter 9: The Birth of the Asylum
Techniques/practices of early psychiatric reformers: Tuke, Pinel
Descriptions contrast with perceived message of book
Foucault and “antipsychiatry”
Goya – “The Madhouse”
Concluding Chapter and Beyond:
The relationship between art and madness
The art of the mentally ill: Outsider Art, Intuitive Art, Art Brut
Often demonstrates an unawareness of conventional notions of technique and aesthetics.
Exists outside of lineage, contemporary community
Reflects unique perspective, condition of artist
Willem Van Genk 1
Willem Van Genk 2
Wolfli 1
Wolfli 2
Francis Palanc
Baya
Gaston Teuscher
Madge Gill
Scottie Wilson
Carlo 1
Carlo 2
Madness, transgression, and art- Transgression: Exploring the boundaries of conventional notions of
morality and truth.
- Examples in literature: Bataille, Genet, Artaud, etc.
- Resonates with Foucault:Foucault writes: “madness has become mans possibility for
abolishing both man and the world….it is the last recourse: the end and beginning of everything…it is the ambiguity of chaos and the apocalypse” (F 281).
Foucault and Artaud:- Foucault’s thoughts on madness as ‘the end and beginning of everything’ resonate with Artaud’s writing, particularly his essay, “No More Masterpieces,” in which Artaud declares:
- Reverence for the past works of art serves to imprison the art of today and the art to come. - The phenomena of masterpieces alienates art from the public via its ‘superstitious’ reverence for texts. - If the public finds a given masterpiece irrelevant and incomprehensible, it is not the fault of the public, but the fault of the work itself and system in which such works are defied.
Both Foucault and Artaud see conventional notions of psychology as an obstruction to the potential of art and creativity.
-Artaud holds psychology accountable for “..working relentlessly to reduce the unknown to the known,” (Artaud 77).
- Artaud declares theater must go beyond psychological concerns such as woes over social careerism, money and love.
Both Foucault and Artaud see the dislocating experience of madness as potentially productive, capable of yielding unique insights. Artaud seeks an art which mirrors the experience of madness.
- Artaud proposes a theater which confronts its audience in visceral and disorientating way, a theater which he likens to lava in a volcanic explosion.
Madness as inspiration: an example
Rafael Alberti “Concerning the Angels” - Background:
Among the “generation of 27” Written during a depressive episode brought on by a
failed love affair and the suicide of a friend.
- Alberti’s description of the writing process
- Alberti discusses ways in which his mental state dictated his writing style and process
Eviction Evil or good angels, I don’t know which,hurled you into my soul. Lonely,without furniture or sleeping space,vacant. Intrepidly, the wind woundsthe walls,the finest panes of glass. Dampness. Chains. Cries.Wind guests. I ask you:when you leave the house,tell mewhich evil, which cruel angelswill want to rent it again? Tell me.
From “Concerning the Angels,” by Rafael Alberti.
Concluding Thoughts
How does Foucault’s Madness and Civilization apply to Library Science?
Speaks to nature of classification in general, specifically:
The potential for cultural perspective and/or cultural bias to inform the ways in which knowledge or information is classified, structured, limited, and interacted with.