New O&P History Book
Jeff Reznick
Description
Collection
Title:
New O&P History Book
Creator:
Jeff Reznick
Date:
4/1/2002
Text:
Members of the O&P Community,
Those of you interested in the history of prosthetics will welcome NYU's
publication of a new book on the subject: _Artificial Parts, Practical
Lives: Modern Histories of Prosthetics_ edited by Katherine Ott, David
Serlin, and Stephen Mihm (New York University Press, 2002).
My review of the book, which I will write in my capacity as research
fellow here at OPAF, will appear in a forthcoming issue of the Bulletin
of the History of Medicine, published by Johns Hopkins University Press.
If anyone in the O&P community wishes to read the review when it
appears, please let me know and I will be happy to send you a copy.
NYU Press describes the volume on the Barnes and Noble site as follows:
From the wooden teeth of George Washington, to the so-called Bly
prosthesis, popular in the 1860's and boasting easy uniform motions of
the limb, to today's lifelike approximations, prosthetic devices reveal
the extent to which the evolution and design of technologies of the body
are intertwined with both the practical and subjective needs of human
beings.
Consider the display of the A. A. Marks Company at the Columbian
Exposition of 1893. Four large display cases containing over fifty
artificial limbs were roofed by a gilded dome and a colossal golden leg
which towered over the surrounding exhibits. In a testament to the
demand for prostheses, no fewer than nine manufacturers of artificial
limbs had assembled to display their wares, silently commemorating the
grim toll of the industrial age. The flywheels and pulleys of the new
mills and factories severed arms and legs with alarming frequency and
many Civil War doctors had amputated destroyed limbs rather than
reconstructing them. At the same time, the importance of personal
appearance was increasingly central, leading one writer from the
antebellum era to remark that the inner character of strangers may best
be read in a person's looks, just as one reads in plainly written books.
The peculiar history of prosthetic devices sheds light on the
relationship between technological change and the civilizing process of
modernity, and analyzes the concrete materials of prosthetics which
carry with them ideologies of body, ideals, body politics and culture.
Simultaneously critiquing, historicizing and theorizing prosthetics,
Artificial Parts, Practical Lives lays out a balanced and complex
picture of its subject, neither vilifying nor celebrating the merger of
flesh and machine.
Should you decide to purchase this book, or any other, from Barnes and
Noble, I encourage you to do so via the OPAF web site:
www.opfund.org/support/. B&N contributes two percent of every purchase
directly to OPAF to help support our programs.
Thanks very much.
Jeff Reznick
---
Jeffrey S. Reznick, Ph.D.
Director and Senior Research Fellow
Orthotic & Prosthetic Assistance Fund, Inc. (OPAF)
330 John Carlyle Street, Suite 200
Alexandria, Virginia 22314
Tel 571.431.0818
eFax 415.534.1857
Email <Email Address Redacted>
Web www.opfund.org
Support OPAF through our web site
www.opfund.org/support/
Those of you interested in the history of prosthetics will welcome NYU's
publication of a new book on the subject: _Artificial Parts, Practical
Lives: Modern Histories of Prosthetics_ edited by Katherine Ott, David
Serlin, and Stephen Mihm (New York University Press, 2002).
My review of the book, which I will write in my capacity as research
fellow here at OPAF, will appear in a forthcoming issue of the Bulletin
of the History of Medicine, published by Johns Hopkins University Press.
If anyone in the O&P community wishes to read the review when it
appears, please let me know and I will be happy to send you a copy.
NYU Press describes the volume on the Barnes and Noble site as follows:
From the wooden teeth of George Washington, to the so-called Bly
prosthesis, popular in the 1860's and boasting easy uniform motions of
the limb, to today's lifelike approximations, prosthetic devices reveal
the extent to which the evolution and design of technologies of the body
are intertwined with both the practical and subjective needs of human
beings.
Consider the display of the A. A. Marks Company at the Columbian
Exposition of 1893. Four large display cases containing over fifty
artificial limbs were roofed by a gilded dome and a colossal golden leg
which towered over the surrounding exhibits. In a testament to the
demand for prostheses, no fewer than nine manufacturers of artificial
limbs had assembled to display their wares, silently commemorating the
grim toll of the industrial age. The flywheels and pulleys of the new
mills and factories severed arms and legs with alarming frequency and
many Civil War doctors had amputated destroyed limbs rather than
reconstructing them. At the same time, the importance of personal
appearance was increasingly central, leading one writer from the
antebellum era to remark that the inner character of strangers may best
be read in a person's looks, just as one reads in plainly written books.
The peculiar history of prosthetic devices sheds light on the
relationship between technological change and the civilizing process of
modernity, and analyzes the concrete materials of prosthetics which
carry with them ideologies of body, ideals, body politics and culture.
Simultaneously critiquing, historicizing and theorizing prosthetics,
Artificial Parts, Practical Lives lays out a balanced and complex
picture of its subject, neither vilifying nor celebrating the merger of
flesh and machine.
Should you decide to purchase this book, or any other, from Barnes and
Noble, I encourage you to do so via the OPAF web site:
www.opfund.org/support/. B&N contributes two percent of every purchase
directly to OPAF to help support our programs.
Thanks very much.
Jeff Reznick
---
Jeffrey S. Reznick, Ph.D.
Director and Senior Research Fellow
Orthotic & Prosthetic Assistance Fund, Inc. (OPAF)
330 John Carlyle Street, Suite 200
Alexandria, Virginia 22314
Tel 571.431.0818
eFax 415.534.1857
Email <Email Address Redacted>
Web www.opfund.org
Support OPAF through our web site
www.opfund.org/support/
Citation
Jeff Reznick, “New O&P History Book,” Digital Resource Foundation for Orthotics and Prosthetics, accessed November 16, 2024, https://library.drfop.org/items/show/218866.
