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Biomedical subjects

C Gradmann

Publications and source records attributed to C Gradmann.

9 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2000

Invisible enemies: bacteriology and the language of politics in imperial Germany.

The text analyzes the related semantics of bacteriology and politics in imperial Germany. The rapid success of bacteriology in the 1880s and 1890s was due not least to the fact that scientific concepts of bacteria as "the smallest but most dangerous enemies of mankind" (R. Koch) resonated with contemporary ideas about political enemies. Bacteriological hygiene was expected to provide answers to social and political problems. At the same time metaphors borrowed from bacteriological terminology were incorporated into the political language of the time. While the "high command of our doctors" (F.J. Cohn) fought diseases, some contemporaries were identified with members of the evil species of "bacillus communis odii." Both imperialistic politics and bacteriological science relied on images of inferior and invisible but potent enemies. Both were able to increase their prestige via a mutual interchange of their vocabularies.

Bacteria↗
PubMed2000

Money and microbes: Robert Koch, tuberculin and the Foundation of the Institute for Infectious Diseases in Berlin in 1891.

Starting from an assessment of how far Robert Koch's bacteriology had developed in the late 1880s this paper attempts to analyse different aspects of the process that led to the foundation of the Berlin Institute for Infectious Diseases in 1891. With the development of his supposed cure against tuberculosis, tuberculin, Koch attempted to give his research a new direction, earn a fortune with the profits and become more independent of Prussian government officials who, up to that point, had had a major influence on his career. In the period following the presentation of the cure in autumn 1890, however, it became clear that tuberculin's value in treatment was at most dubious. Thus, the failure of tuberculin meant that Koch had to drop his own plans and accommodate those of the Prussian Ministry of Culture. As a result he assumed directorship of the newly founded Institute for Infectious Diseases in Berlin. Even though this was definitely a prestigious position it reaffirmed Koch's dependency on Prussian government officials and was by no means the kind of institution he had aimed for at the outset.

Academies and Institutes↗
PubMed1996

[Not Available].

The text analyses metaphors of bacteriology which were extensively used in Germany during the era of William II. These display--in a vivid exchange with the scientific concepts of the age--a specific popular understanding of disease based on bacteriology. Disease is essentially seen as a war of physicians against microbes. While popularizing science bacteriological metaphors became part of the political language of their age. At the same time the prestige of bacteriology was in turn employed to lend credibility to pictures of assumed enemies--by portraying them as infectious diseases. Although the political language of bacteriology differed from the social darwinism of the age in important structural and semantic aspects, it nevertheless influenced the political language of its time, for example by becoming a blueprint of antisemitic rhetorics.

Bacteriology↗
PubMed1995

[Not Available].

The text analyses Koch's microbiology and its rapid success within the context of the intellectual history of Wilhelminian [1888-1918] Germany. Studies of visual and verbal popularisations of microbiology show that scientific theory of microbiology, by communicating in the political language of its age, was followed by an equally specific popular image of the same topic. This included both popularisations of microbiology in militaristic metaphors and the analogous use of microbiological concepts as popularisations of imperialistic and agressive concepts of politics. Thus, the development and success of microbiology is linked to the development of the political language of its age.

Bacteriology↗
PubMed1993

[Not Available].

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Germany↗