Event Title
Multiple personality and gender in late nineteenth-century France
Start Date
25-6-2010 10:45 AM
End Date
25-6-2010 11:45 AM
Description
This presentation is part of the Feminist Perspectives in the Sciences: Epidemiology track.
This paper seeks to explain the preponderance of women with multiple personality in late nineteenth century France. It proposes a new explanation to replace the explanation Ian Hacking has provided for the preponderance of women in this period.
Hacking discerns four waves of multiple personality in the past two hundred years. A distinctive feature of all of these waves is that women diagnosed with multiple personality disorder - or dissociative identity disorder as it is now more often called - outnumber men by far. Hacking sets out to consider the aspects of each of these waves that might be associated with the preponderance of women and concludes that there is a special explanation for all of these waves but one: the wave that swept over France in the years 1875 – 1900. Hacking is led to consider that in this period alone dissociative identity disorder (DID) “appears to have been seized upon for reasons having nothing to do with gender, except that DID patients were drawn from a pool of those with hysterical symptoms who were highly hypnotizable.”
According to Hacking, the second wave in France after 1875 coincides with the dominance of (Jean-Martin) Charcot and his diagnosis of grande hystérie. All people with multiple personalities were described as having hysterical conditions. . .They were all drawn from a “pool” of hysterical patients. Although male hysteria was known and much discussed. . .the vast majority of the pool of patients with hysterical symptoms were female. Hence, a special explanation for the preponderance of women with DID is not necessary; one should instead explain the preponderance of women called “hysterics”.
Should we take this to be a valid explanation for the preponderance of women who were diagnosed with DID in this period? It stands to reason that DID patients would be drawn from a pool of patients with hysterical symptoms; in this period DID was thought to be a bizarre form of hysteria. It also stands to reason that when women were making up the bulk of the patient population in this pool there would be many more women diagnosed with DID. Does it stand to reason however that women were drawn from this pool for reasons having nothing to do – at least nothing explicitly to do - with the fact that they were women? Of all of the reasons DID might have been seized on in this period would none of them have anything specifically to do with gender?
Perhaps there is yet another explanation for the preponderance of women with DID in this period. I argue that DID, or dédoublement as it was known at this time, was standardly associated with women because women, it was thought, were closer to nature.
The bodily ailments that became part of the symptomatology of DID left no doubt as to women’s close proximity to nature - or what at least was on the minds of the doctors who seized on DID. Symptoms would include paralysis, spasms, tremors, bleedings and abnormalities of the senses, such as restrictions of the field of vision and loss of taste or smell.
It is worth noting that bodily ailments only became part of the symptomatology of DID after 1875. The literature of double consciousness before 1875, as Hacking points out, “is full of young women who switch from the docile to the daring, from the melancholy to the merry.” While Hacking accounts for the profound difference after 1875 in the emerging science of memory I also want to point out that after 1875 the closeness of women to nature also had to be accounted for in accounts of this disorder. Certain bodily functions for example were considered to put women at risk. On the onset of her first menstrual period Marceline, a patient who came under Pierre Janet’s care in 1887, lapsed back into her former state. Janet was consequently forced to hypnotize her again.
If women had always been thought to be closer to nature the scientific study of DID in the years 1875 – 1900 was proving that they were. Women were easily hypnotized, the female personality was unstable, women were prone to dissociation and they were prone to intense emotions. Male multiples would be seen as close to nature as well. Louis Vivet’s physicians pointed to his “monkey-like impudence” and to his “savage impulsiveness”. Moreover his physicians would note the role of intense emotion in his affliction. But the assumption was that Vivet’s childhood traumas had “knocked his brain out of kilter, plunging the two brain halves into a state of disequilibrium and pathological independence.”
I have put forward in this paper an explanation for the preponderance of women with multiple personality in late nineteenth century France. I suspect that there are other explanations for this as well. Of all the reasons physicians, philosophers, neurologists and psychologists seized on multiple personality in these years it seems to me that at least some of these reasons had to do with gender.
Multiple personality and gender in late nineteenth-century France
This presentation is part of the Feminist Perspectives in the Sciences: Epidemiology track.
This paper seeks to explain the preponderance of women with multiple personality in late nineteenth century France. It proposes a new explanation to replace the explanation Ian Hacking has provided for the preponderance of women in this period.
Hacking discerns four waves of multiple personality in the past two hundred years. A distinctive feature of all of these waves is that women diagnosed with multiple personality disorder - or dissociative identity disorder as it is now more often called - outnumber men by far. Hacking sets out to consider the aspects of each of these waves that might be associated with the preponderance of women and concludes that there is a special explanation for all of these waves but one: the wave that swept over France in the years 1875 – 1900. Hacking is led to consider that in this period alone dissociative identity disorder (DID) “appears to have been seized upon for reasons having nothing to do with gender, except that DID patients were drawn from a pool of those with hysterical symptoms who were highly hypnotizable.”
According to Hacking, the second wave in France after 1875 coincides with the dominance of (Jean-Martin) Charcot and his diagnosis of grande hystérie. All people with multiple personalities were described as having hysterical conditions. . .They were all drawn from a “pool” of hysterical patients. Although male hysteria was known and much discussed. . .the vast majority of the pool of patients with hysterical symptoms were female. Hence, a special explanation for the preponderance of women with DID is not necessary; one should instead explain the preponderance of women called “hysterics”.
Should we take this to be a valid explanation for the preponderance of women who were diagnosed with DID in this period? It stands to reason that DID patients would be drawn from a pool of patients with hysterical symptoms; in this period DID was thought to be a bizarre form of hysteria. It also stands to reason that when women were making up the bulk of the patient population in this pool there would be many more women diagnosed with DID. Does it stand to reason however that women were drawn from this pool for reasons having nothing to do – at least nothing explicitly to do - with the fact that they were women? Of all of the reasons DID might have been seized on in this period would none of them have anything specifically to do with gender?
Perhaps there is yet another explanation for the preponderance of women with DID in this period. I argue that DID, or dédoublement as it was known at this time, was standardly associated with women because women, it was thought, were closer to nature.
The bodily ailments that became part of the symptomatology of DID left no doubt as to women’s close proximity to nature - or what at least was on the minds of the doctors who seized on DID. Symptoms would include paralysis, spasms, tremors, bleedings and abnormalities of the senses, such as restrictions of the field of vision and loss of taste or smell.
It is worth noting that bodily ailments only became part of the symptomatology of DID after 1875. The literature of double consciousness before 1875, as Hacking points out, “is full of young women who switch from the docile to the daring, from the melancholy to the merry.” While Hacking accounts for the profound difference after 1875 in the emerging science of memory I also want to point out that after 1875 the closeness of women to nature also had to be accounted for in accounts of this disorder. Certain bodily functions for example were considered to put women at risk. On the onset of her first menstrual period Marceline, a patient who came under Pierre Janet’s care in 1887, lapsed back into her former state. Janet was consequently forced to hypnotize her again.
If women had always been thought to be closer to nature the scientific study of DID in the years 1875 – 1900 was proving that they were. Women were easily hypnotized, the female personality was unstable, women were prone to dissociation and they were prone to intense emotions. Male multiples would be seen as close to nature as well. Louis Vivet’s physicians pointed to his “monkey-like impudence” and to his “savage impulsiveness”. Moreover his physicians would note the role of intense emotion in his affliction. But the assumption was that Vivet’s childhood traumas had “knocked his brain out of kilter, plunging the two brain halves into a state of disequilibrium and pathological independence.”
I have put forward in this paper an explanation for the preponderance of women with multiple personality in late nineteenth century France. I suspect that there are other explanations for this as well. Of all the reasons physicians, philosophers, neurologists and psychologists seized on multiple personality in these years it seems to me that at least some of these reasons had to do with gender.