In line with their vast expansion over the last few decades, the brain sciences --- including neurobiology, psychopharmacology, biological psychiatry, and brain imaging --- are becoming increasingly prominent in a variety of cultural formations, from self-help guides and the arts to advertising and public health programmes. This article, which introduces the special issue of History of the Human Science on `Neuroscience, Power and Culture', considers the ways that social and historical research can, through empirical investigations grounded in the observation of what is actually happening and has already happened in the sciences of mind and brain, complement speculative discussions of the possible social implications of neuroscience that now appear regularly in the media and in philosophical bioethics. It suggests that the neurosciences are best understood in terms of their lineage within the `psy'-disciplines, and that, accordingly, our analyses of them will be strengthened by drawing on existing literatures on the history and politics of psychology --- particularly those that analyze formations of knowledge, power and subjectivity associated with the discipline and its practical applications. Additionally, it argues against taking today's neuroscientific facts and brain-targetting technologies as starting points for analysis, and for greater recognition of the ways that these are shaped by historical, cultural and political-economic forces.
...MoreDescription Contents:
Article Brenninkmeijer, Jonna (2010) Taking Care of One's Brain: How Manipulating the Brain Changes People's Selves. History of the Human Sciences (pp. 107-126).
Article Abi-Rached, Joelle M.; Rose, Nikolas (2010) The Birth of the Neuromolecular Gaze. History of the Human Sciences (pp. 11-36).
Article Langlitz, Nicolas (2010) The Persistence of the Subjective in Neuropsychopharmacology: Observations of Contemporary Hallucinogen Research. History of the Human Sciences (pp. 37-57).
Article McGoey, Linsey (2010) Profitable Failure: Antidepressant Drugs and the Triumph of Flawed Experiments. History of the Human Sciences (pp. 58-78).
Article Rose, Nikolas (2010) “Screen and Intervene”: Governing Risky Brains. History of the Human Sciences (pp. 79-105).
Article
Flora Lysen;
(2017)
It Blinks, It Thinks?: Luminous Brains and a Visual Culture of Electric Display, circa 1930
(/isis/citation/CBB148102486/)
Article
Gere, Cathy;
(2013)
Curating Aphasia: Pierre Paul Broca's Museological Science
(/isis/citation/CBB001201231/)
Article
Smail, Daniel Lord;
(2014)
Neurohistory in Action: Hoarding and the Human Past
(/isis/citation/CBB001321207/)
Article
Wise, M. Norton;
(2007)
What Can Local Circulation Explain? The Case of Helmholtz's Frog-Drawing-Machine in Berlin
(/isis/citation/CBB000931384/)
Book
Gomes, Mario;
(2008)
Gedankenlesemaschinen. Modelle für eine Poetologie des Inneren Monologs
(/isis/citation/CBB001022069/)
Book
Kandel, Eric R;
(2012)
The Age of Insight: The Quest to Understand the Unconscious in Art, Mind, and Brain, from Vienna 1900 to the Present
(/isis/citation/CBB001201847/)
Article
Ghassemzadeh, Habibollah;
Posner, Michael I.;
Rothbart, Mary K.;
(2013)
Contributions of Hebb and Vygotsky to an Integrated Science of Mind
(/isis/citation/CBB001320368/)
Article
Mattia Della Rocca;
(2017)
Of the Artistic Nude and Technological Behaviorism: Leon Harmon and the First Steps towards Neuromorphic Hardware
(/isis/citation/CBB514560635/)
Article
Brenninkmeijer, Jonna;
(2010)
Taking Care of One's Brain: How Manipulating the Brain Changes People's Selves
(/isis/citation/CBB000953793/)
Article
Claudio Pogliano;
(2017)
Lucky Triune Brain: Chronicles of Paul D. MacLean’s Neuro-Catchword
(/isis/citation/CBB261033685/)
Article
Silvia Casini;
(2017)
Beyond the Neuro-Realism Fallacy: From John R. Mallard’s Hand-painted MRI Image of a Mouse to BioArt Scenarios
(/isis/citation/CBB029422487/)
Article
Vidal, Fernando;
(2009)
Brainhood, Anthropological Figure of Modernity
(/isis/citation/CBB000953746/)
Article
Stadler, Max;
(2014)
Neurohistory Is Bunk?: The Not-So-Deep History of the Postclassical Mind
(/isis/citation/CBB001321209/)
Article
Cliodhna O’Connor;
Helene Joffe;
(September 2015)
How the Public Engages With Brain Optimization: The Media-mind Relationship
(/isis/citation/CBB441371620/)
Book
Franco Fabbro;
(2023)
Ipnosi e cervello sociale. Neuroscienze e filosofia politica
(/isis/citation/CBB237713944/)
Book
Finkelstein, Gabriel;
(2013)
Emil du Bois-Reymond Neuroscience, Self, and Society in Nineteenth-Century Germany
(/isis/citation/CBB001451414/)
Book
Mark Dennis Robinson;
(2019)
The Market in Mind: How Financialization Is Shaping Neuroscience, Translational Medicine, and Innovation in Biotechnology
(/isis/citation/CBB602177290/)
Book
Peter Janich;
(2018)
What Is Information?
(/isis/citation/CBB403064080/)
Article
Mattia Della Rocca;
Claudio Pogliano;
(2017)
Different Histories from 20th Century Neuroscience: Introduction
(/isis/citation/CBB095653917/)
Article
Frank W. Stahnisch;
Gül Russell;
(2016)
New Perspectives on Forced Migration in the History of Twentieth-Century Neuroscience
(/isis/citation/CBB543118896/)
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