The AHRC-funded Psychiatry and the Arts in Nineteenth-Century Britain network aims to bring together scholars working on interdisciplinary historical projects, as well as practitioners in healthcare, the creative arts and the heritage sector. We plan three symposia and a two-day conference. The symposia focus largely on historical matters, while the conference will bring together historians and practitioners to find new directions for collaborations, impact and engagement.
PAN contact details: PAN@open.ac.uk / @PsychArts19c / https://fass.open.ac.uk/research/projects/PAN
Network collaborations
Symposium 3, 21 March 2024, online
Our third symposium will take place on Teams on 21 March. Please book via the link: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/psychiatry-and-the-arts-in-nineteenth-century-britain-symposium-3-tickets-815106404197?aff=oddtdtcreator.
| 10:00 | Tech check |
| 10:30-12:30 | Welcome and introduction Anne-Marie Beller, ‘Authors and Alienists: Networks of Victorian Psychiatry and Popular Fiction’ Mathilde Vialard, ‘Mental Health at Home in Sensation Novels’ Kathleen Eck Thorman, ‘Medical and Literary Language of the Victorian Madwoman’ |
| 12:30-1:30 | break |
| 1:30-3:30 | Angela Chudley/ Flo and Jo Gomersall/ Doll, ‘New Dialogues – Beyond The Page’ Valentin Maier, ‘Representations of Mental Conditions in Nineteenth-Century Britain Inspired Tabletop Role-Playing Games’ Anna Jamieson, ‘Finding Agency in the Asylum: The Material World of Elizabeth Hitchcock’ |
| 3:30-4 | Final discussion and close |
Symposium 2, 26 October 2023, online
Our second symposium will take place on Teams on 26 October. Please email the PAN address PAN@open.ac.uk if you would like to attend (there is no charge and no need to book).
| 9:30 | Technical set-up |
| 10:00 | Rosemary Golding, Welcome and Introduction Kevin Jones, Diagnosis and the Forms of Insanity: Assessing psychiatrists’ responses to Victorian popular fiction Mila Daskalova, Invisible Poets: The ‘Mad Genius’ Myth and Poetry in Victorian Asylum Periodicals |
| 11:15 | break |
| 11:30 | Ute Oswald, Art and Beauty in Nineteenth-Century British Asylums Cheryl McGeachan, Art Extraordinary and the entangled worlds of mental ill-health |
| 12:30 | Discussion and close |
Symposium 1, 9 June 2023, 9:30-4, The Crichton, Bankend Road, Dumfries
Our first symposium took place on 9 June, at The Crichton campus in Dumfries. Together with six historical papers, we enjoyed a tour of the estate. The evening prior to the symposium featured a concert of music produced as part of a recent oral history project, Up the Middle Road: Crichton Stories of Recovery and Resilience. For a report of the symposium see this blog page.
Symposium programme
| 9:30 | Arrival and Registration |
| 9:45 | Welcome and Introduction |
| 10-12:30 | Valentina Bold – The Crichton |
| Ute Oswald – ‘Recreation in 19th C Asylums: An Overview and a Theatre Case Study’ | |
| Maureen Park – ‘Picturing Patients at Crichton Royal Institution, Dumfries, in the mid-nineteenth century’ | |
| Jessica Campbell – ‘”What Shall We Wear? Whom Personate?”: Fancy Dress, Identity and Performance in the British Insane Asylum c.1840-1914’ | |
| 12:30 | lunch |
| 1:30 | campus tour |
| 2:30-4 | Rosemary Golding – ‘Concerts and cures at the Crichton Royal Institution, 1840-1860’ |
| Laura Blair – ‘Without the interference of the physician: therapeutic reading at the Crichton Royal Institution’ | |
| Mila Daskalova – ‘The Gartnavel Castle and its inhabitants: patients’ reimagining of Royal Glasgow Asylum in the Gartnavel Gazette’ |
musichealthandhappiness 