The nerves have been the principal focus of ‘fashionable disease’ studies, but the stomach arguably has an equal claim for consideration. The stomach and bowels were not only implicated in a wide range of digestive diseases, but also in almost all à la mode conditions, from nervousness to the ‘flying gout’. This was due both to the connotations of over-eating with wealth, and because of the assumed link between the digestive system and the mind. This talk examines the development of thinking on the mind-stomach nexus, and how such thinking was incorporated into critiques of modern Britain.
Speaker: Dr James Kennaway