The Flesh is Weak: A History of Pain
Duration: 54 mins 25 secs
Share this media item:
Embed this media item:
Embed this media item:
About this item
| Description: | Joanna Bourke, Professor of History at Birkbeck, University of London, gave the seventh lecture in this series on Thursday 1 May 2014 at 5.30pm in the Lee Hall. |
|---|
| Created: | 2014-08-11 16:39 | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Collection: | Lee Seng Tee Distinguished Lecture | ||
| Publisher: | University of Cambridge | ||
| Copyright: | Wolfson College | ||
| Language: | eng (English) | ||
| Keywords: | Wolson College; Lee Lecture; history and philosophy of science; Professor Joanna Bourke; University of Cambridge; | ||
| Credits: |
|
||
| Abstract: | Pain is “like a storm”, observed the distinguished surgeon René Leriche in 1939, in which the patient is “beyond all capability of analysing it”. Taming this storm was a task fraught with anxiety for physicians as well as patients. In this talk, Professor Bourke explored the various ways that people in the past have interpreted unpleasant sensations. Pain does not emerge naturally from physiological processes, but in negotiation with social worlds. Is pain a productive force or solely destructive? How have people learnt to conduct themselves when in pain and what languages do they seize hold of in order to overcome some of the difficulties in communicating suffering to other people? |
|---|---|
Available Formats
| Format | Quality | Bitrate | Size | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MPEG-4 Video | 640x360 | 1.93 Mbits/sec | 789.77 MB | View | Download | |
| WebM | 640x360 | 1.03 Mbits/sec | 422.73 MB | View | Download | |
| iPod Video | 480x270 | 520.61 kbits/sec | 207.49 MB | View | Download | |
| MP3 | 44100 Hz | 249.75 kbits/sec | 99.66 MB | Listen | Download | |
| Auto * | (Allows browser to choose a format it supports) | |||||