A cultural history of medical vitalism in enlightenment Montpellier
This study is a cultural history of Montpellier vitalism, regarded by many historians as the leading school of medicine in the French Enlightenment. Offering a holistic understanding of physical-moral relation in place of Descartes' mind-body dualism, Montpellier vitalism supplied essential discursive foundations of the medical enlightenment.
History
1 online resource (382 pages)
9780754608813, 9781351962568, 0754608816, 1351962566
1003226384
Contents: Introduction; A medical town: Montpellier in the 18th century; A university in the Enlightenment: the University of Medicine of Montpellier; Boissier de Sauvages and the emergence of vitalism in Montpellier; The ascent to Paris: Montpellier physicians in the capital of enlightenment; Vitalism and the encyclopedist movement; Time of troubles: the university-court connection in the late Ancien Régime; Semiotics, smallpox, sex: from the practical to the philosophical in vitalist medicine; Barthez and the "Science of Man"; Vitalism in the late Enlightenment; Conclusion: the end of the Enlightenment and the eclipse of Montpellier; Bibliography; Index.