| Date | Time | Location |
|---|---|---|
| Thursday, September 30, 2010 | 12:00PM - 2:00PM | Seminar Room 108N, Munk Centre For International Studies 1 Devonshire Place |
Asian Institute PhD Seminar Series
The eruption of bubonic plague in Hong Kong in 1894 was the flashpoint of the Third Pandemic, marking a critical juncture in the story of plague and plague fighters, and also a galvanizing moment in the history of the port colony. The spread and containment of plague was accomplished through the agency of human actors, among them a rapidly growing Chinese population in the basin of Victoria Peak, a colonial regime governing from atop the Peak, an emerging class of Chinese elites, and teams of foreign scientists arriving in Hong Kong in hot pursuit of the pathogen. The arc of the plague was potentiated, also, by non-human agents: Hong Kong’s subtropical, monsoonic environment, the mountainous geography of the territory that supported various configurations of power, migratory and commercial flows between China, the British empire and Hong Kong’s harbour, the ghosts of Chinese socio-religious tradition, heterogenous schemas of the body and disease in Chinese and Western medicine, and, of course, the fleas that bite rats, vectors of infection. I suggest that the writing a history of plague in Hong Kong hinges on weaving together these streams of human and non-human agency. In particular, looking at Hong Kong in this moment of iatric crisis through the lens of the mangle, Andrew Pickering’s contribution to the evolving field of science studies, reveals how human and non-human agents constitute the experience of embodiment, the practice of medical science, and the logics of imperialism, and not merely the writing of the histories of such.
Meaghan Marian is a doctoral candidate in the Department of History at the University of Toronto preparing a dissertation on the intersections of Chinese and Western medical science in Hong Kong, Macao, and China. Her research has been supported by the SSHRC Canada Graduate Scholarship, the Ontario Graduate Scholarship and the Lupina Senior Doctoral Fellowship. She has presented papers on the history of medicine, ethnomathematics, and an ethnography of Tibetan martial arts at graduate conferences.
If you are attending a Munk School event and require accommodation(s), please email the event contact listed above to make appropriate arrangements.
Disclaimer: Please note that events posted on this website are considered to be public events – unless otherwise stated – and you are choosing to enter a space where your image and/or voice may be captured as part of event proceedings that may be made public as part of a broadcast, webcast, or publication (online and in print). We make every effort to ensure your personal information is kept and used in compliance with the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act (FIPPA). If you have any questions please get in touch with our office at munkschool@utoronto.ca or 416-946-8900.