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SUMMARY:The anatomy of touch: nature\, knowledge and technologies of touch
  in the Renaissance - Viktoria von Hoffmann (University of Liège / Univer
 sity of Cambridge)
DTSTART:20160523T120000Z
DTEND:20160523T131500Z
UID:TALK65938@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:39097
DESCRIPTION:In the last few decades\, promising new approaches to the stud
 y of the senses and to the body have shed new light on how people in the p
 ast experienced their lives\, as much as on the ways in which knowledge ab
 out self and the world was being shaped\, negotiated and transformed. Alth
 ough all the senses could contribute to these discussions\, scholars have 
 predominantly focused on sight and visual cultures\, leaving other potenti
 ally fruitful avenues unexplored. Touch\, especially\, has received little
  attention in historical research\, where it has been reduced to a history
  of sexuality\, leaving its other dimensions unexamined. Yet this sense\, 
 considered the defining sense of human nature\, raises important questions
  regarding the part played by the lower senses in knowledge production\, a
 s well as in society and culture at large.\n\nSources concerning Renaissan
 ce anatomy provide a significant lens through which to examine the part pl
 ayed by touch in the early modern study of Nature\, as evidenced by the pr
 actice of dissections\, which engaged the body\, the skin and the hand of 
 the anatomists\, in their attempt to unveil the truths hidden inside the b
 ody. Using theoretical writings (anatomical textbooks) as well as sources 
 more closely linked to daily practices (such as university notes of medica
 l students)\, this paper seeks to explore the technologies of touch that w
 ere displayed in 16th-century anatomical practices and discourses\, with t
 he aim of highlighting the epistemological value of the sense of touch in 
 early modern inquiries about Nature and the human body.
LOCATION:Seminar Room 1\, Department of History and Philosophy of Science
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