Medical Theory, Surgical Practice: Studies in the History of Surgery

by Christopher Lawrence

There is a considerable literature on the history of surgery, most of it describing breakthrough operations, famous surgeons, or great discoveries such as the introduction of anesthesia. But modern developments in the history of medicine suggest that surgery needs to be explored as more than a subject with a simple empirical and scientific history.

Medical Theory, Surgical Practice is the first account to take a critical look at orthodox surgical history, examining the relationship between medical concepts of disease and the practice of surgery within particular historical settings. It is also the only book to bring recent medical historical analysis to the history of surgery. The contributors assert that one cannot understand concepts of disease without a thorough analysis of the social relations embedded in their context.

This lively collection of essays illustrates how surgery came to be seen as one of the great achievements of late Victorian culture. Contributors also discuss how medical theory and surgical practice relate to their social organization, how physical diagnosis developed in medicine, whether Lister's antiseptic techniques and anesthesia actually caused a surgical revolution, and how the act of surgery increasingly came to be possible, allowable and imaginable through the course of the nineteenth century.

352 pages, Hardcover

First published June 5, 1992