December 2010

Plakat für ein anatomisches Museum, Hamburg, 1913 (from Morbid Anatomy)

Next Friday, 17 December, Elena Corradini at the Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia organises a seminar on “Visiting an Anatomical Museum: curiosity or training?”:

Anatomical University Museums are the keepers of collections which often are very old and different for their consistence and typology. These museums have a fundamental role for the preservation and valorization of cultural historical‐scientific heritage, therefore must become a place of interdisciplinary synthesis. They represent the progress of studies in the past and for the future, and play their fundamental role for the research and for the promotion of educational activities. This role will allow them to be a service for University students and professors, and to spread scientific knowledge to different audiences. Developing the capacity of museums to work in a network is necessary for them to become centres for the production of knowledge, activities and services.

Speakers include a number of directors and curators from Italian university anatomical museums together with the directors of the Josephinum of Vienna and the Museum of Medical University of Danzig:

• Giovanni Mazzotti, University of Bologna: Visiting an Anatomical Museum: curiosity or training?
• Sonia Horn, University of Wien: The growth of collections for the permanence of an historical Anatomical Museum. The case of the Josephinum in Vienna.
• Roberto Toni, University of Parma: The Anatomical Museum as a research source in the field of
  biomedical robotics: the Tenchini project at the University of Parma
• Alessandro Ruggeri, Nicolò Nicoli Aldini, Stefano Durante, Vittorio Delfino Pesce, University of Bologna: The visit of the Anatomical Waxes Museum “Luigi Cattaneo” center of in-depth research of the Bolognese medical tradition of XIXth century and of training for modern education
• Ugo Pastorino, National Tumour Institute, Milan: The project for a virtual archive of human body images
• Carla Garbarino, University of Pavia: The anatomical collections of the Museum for the history of the University
• Marek Bukowski, University of Gdansk: An Anatomical collection and Museum of Medical University
• Berenice Cavarra, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia: Medicine and the study of the living being in XVIIth and XVIIIth centuries
• Vincenzo Esposito, Second University of Neaples: Anatomical Museums between past historical identity and present cultural crossbreeding
• Marina Cimino, University of Padua: The birth in a museum or the birth of a museum: the obstetric collection in Padua
• Elena Corradini, Elisa Orlando, Daniela Nasi, Silvia Rossi, Sara Uboldi, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia: POMUI ‐ The Portal of Italian University Museums
• Giorgio Bonsanti, University of Florence; Elena Corradini, Berenice Cavarra, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia; Paolo Nadalini, INP, Institut National du Patrimoine, Paris; Luigi Vigna, Opificio delle Pietre Dure, Florence; Isabelle Pradier, INP, Institut National du Patrimoine, Paris: A project for the restoration of anatomical waxes

Info from Silvia Rossi or Sara Uboldi, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia (silvia.rossi@unimore.it; sarauboldi@yahoo.it), +39 059 205 5012

(thanks to Sébastien Soubiran for the tip)

The theme of the 6th annual conference in the ‘Science and the Public’ series, to be held at Kingston University, London, on 2-3 July 2011, is ‘A Quarter Century of PUS: Retrospect and Prospect.’

The meeting takes the publication of the Royal Society’s report into the public understanding of science (the Bodmer Report) in 1985 as its point of departure. Introducing what Brian Wynne and others later called ‘the deficit model’, the Bodmer Report stimulated a widespread interest in the public understanding of science (PUS) in the UK and later in the rest of Europe.

The aim of the meeting is to take stock of where public understanding of science stands now, 25 years later:

Is there still (or was there ever?) a ‘public understanding of science movement’ and if so where is it and what form does it take? Is it now defined by ‘engagement’, by ‘dialogue’ or by some other mode of public interface? Is the deficit model dead and if so has it been properly buried or does it still haunt our corridors? What else is there? What shape does the PUS field now have? Is there a comparable agenda of concerns to that defined by Bodmer and if so what is it? And in what direction(s) should work now be going? What about the critical responses? Where have they taken us and where might they be taking us in future? Is there a consensus or do we remain a field in conflict with entrenched opponents, if no longer actively at ‘war’, then hunkered down in separate bunkers refusing – or simply neglecting – to speak to each other? Is there, indeed, a language we share to communicate with each other, let alone the public?

The organisers invite papers and panels that address themes and issues like:

• reflections on the Bodmer Report and its historical, sociological and/or cultural significance;
• the PUS movement and its off-spring;
• how engaged is ‘engagement’ and how dialogical is ‘dialogue’?
• the prospects and circumspects of ‘citizen science’;
• the new science communication – education, entertainment … or irritation?
• new forms and modes of popularisation;
• technoscience and its consumption;
• science, art and culture – changes, developments, continuities;
• theorising PUS
• methods of research – new developments, new thoughts, new proposals;
• new agendas for the science/public relationship and its academic study.

<250 words abstracts to l.allibone@kingston.ac.uk or s.locke@kingston.ac.uk not later than 28 February 2011.

More info here.

The NIH Office of History has just announced a new batch of Stetten Fellowship for postdoctoral historical research on the biomedical sciences and technology since 1945. The stipends are ~$45,000 per year, include health insurance and office accommodation, computer and phone, and can be renewable to a maximum of 24 months. Application deadline is 31 December 2010. Full announcement here.

Keep on eye open on the journal Heritage & Society (a refurbishment of the only three-year old Heritage Management), edited out of the Center for Heritage & Society at the University of Massachussetts, which will provide a forum for scholarly, professional, and community reflection on the cultural, political, and economic impacts of heritage on contemporary society:

We seek to examine the current social roles of collective memory, historic preservation, cultural resource management, public interpretation, cultural preservation and revitalization, sites of conscience, diasporic heritage, education, legal/legislative developments, cultural heritage ethics, and central heritage concepts such as authenticity, significance, and value.

No website yet, as far as I can see.

If we didn’t have a history of museums, but wanted to invent them now:

a museum invented now would be conversational and authoritative – here’s this thing, and here’s why it’s cool (my emphasis)

(from here)

A great museum is a laboratory where ideas get tested, not a mausoleum full of dead thoughts and bromides.

(Blake Gopnik, “National Portrait Gallery bows to censors, withdraws Wojnarowicz video on gay love”, Washington Post, 30 November 30, 2010; thanks to Judy Chelnick for the link)

After reading Fierce Biotech’s evaluation of the Top 10 Phase III Failures of 2010, I’m convinced that Phase III trials are more exciting than goose-pimple horror movies or the ups and downs of the NYSE.

If a pharma company succeeds, there’s lots (lots!) of money in the waiting. But losses can be excruciatingly high too. Fierce Biotech’s list of the ten worst Phase III drug candidate losers of 2010 is a catalogue of perfect pharma disasters:

• Dimebon
• Ocrelizumab
• Taspoglutide
• Semagacestat
• ASA404
• NOV-002
• Zibotentan
• Vicriviroc
• Recentin
• NV1FGF

Late-stage drug development always requires being prepared for the kind of catastrophic failure that can damage big pharma companies and utterly destroy a smaller outfit

This is the flop side of the usual story of greedy Big Pharma. They earn of lot of dough, yes — but they also lose a lot.

Det er tid at planlægge eventuelle papers til den 23. nordiske medicinhistoriske kongress, som bliver afholdt på Nasjonalt medisinsk museum i Oslo, den 25. – 27. maj 2011

De vil gerne have indlæg om:

* Studier av kunnskap innenfor ulike profesjoner på det helse- og medisinhistoriske området
* Innsamling og bruk av muntlig kildemateriale innenfor helse- og medisinhistorie
* Medisinske bilder. Bildediagnostikk, utvikling og bruk av ulike visuelle framstillinger og framstillingsmåter
* Kunnskapshistorie innenfor nevrologi og hjerneforskning. En utstilling om hjernen, Mind Gap, åpner ved Nasjonalt medisinsk museum i april 2011 og vil presenteres på seminaret
* Emner fra psykiatriens historie
* Internasjonale forbindelser innen helse- og medisinhistorie

Der vil være tre specielt indbudte foredragsholdere (John Pickstone, Ludmilla Jordanova og Nick Hopwood) og i tilknytning til kongressen vil Ludmilla Jordanova desuden lede et kurs for ph.d-studenter onsdag den 25. maj.

400 ord abstracts sendes til medisin@tekniskmuseum.no senest 1. marts 2011. Konferancespråk er engelsk og skandinavisk. Deltageravgiften er 2000 kroner, som dækker deltagelse, fælles frokost og middag onsdag og torsdag, samt frokost fredag.

Kontakt evt. Olav Hamran, medisin@tekniskmuseum.no, eller Anne Kveim Lie, a.h.k.lie@medisin.uio.no

Remember Tom Cruise wawing hands in front of the imaginary screen in the movie Minority Report? Well, Hans Rosling (the famous visualiser-wizard of human demography) does it much better in this awesome presentation of changes in income and life expectance throughout the last 200 years. It’s a BBC production, and will certainly set new standards for digitally enhanced presentations—hopefully also in digitally enhanced museum exhibitions!

(tip from Jessica at Bioephemera; yes, she’s back again!: