E-grāmata: Modernity and Epistemology in Nineteenth-Century Spain: Fringe Discourses

This is a useful collection of essays that moves interestingly between pseudo-science, respectable science and literary culture, and which should make us reconsider what was central and what was marginal in nineteenth-century Spain. After reading the book, the borderline appears, if not blurred, at the very least rather more porous than one had thought. * Bulletin of Spanish Studies * Salvaged from historys dustbin, the fringe discourses in this study present nineteenth-century Spain in a fresh and thought-provoking way. The essays in this volume explore a series of fascinating but often overlooked topics, such as pseudoscience, couvade, pogonology, hypnotism, spiritualism, and more. By shedding light on how science and religion understood human nature during this period, Ryan A. Davis and Alicia Cerezo Paredes show us that the Spanish nineteenth century still has much to offer to the modern scholar. -- Margot Versteeg, University of Kansas Ryan A. Davis and Alicia Cerezo Paredess ingenious collection of essays redefines science by recuperating the broad range of discourses originally found under sciences expansive umbrella. In this important new scholarly monograph, experts from the field focus on the fringefrom non-men to travelogues and beards to ideaphonesin order to offer an extensive and provocative interrogation of nineteenth-century constructions of human identity, gender, evolution, and faith. -- Denise DuPont, Southern Methodist University This volume challenges the predominant conception of the antagonism between science and spirituality in nineteenth-century Spain, and shows how these two supposed enemies cohabited with greater ease than most scholars have ever realized. While focused on the nineteenth century, the essays ultimately urge us to question the validity of this dichotomy in contemporary times as well. The volume is a superb resource for all scholars of the nineteenth century and for all those interested in the history of science. -- Joyce Tolliver, University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign In this collection, Ryan A. Davis and Alicia Cerezo Paredes aim to correct a sort of scholarly amnesia that has largely ignored what they refer to as fringe discoursessuch as phrenology, hypnotism, spiritualism, mysticism. Following a rising tide of recent scholarship on similar topics from critics such as Iarocci and Gullón, this volume offers a plethora of insights on these discourses and in the process proposes a more nuanced understanding of the cultural milieu in Spains nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by undoing the dichotomous view of human nature proposed by the monoliths of Science and Religion. -- Susan Walter, University of Denver