The Neuroscientific Turn: Transdisciplinarity in the Age of the Brain PDF
Preview The Neuroscientific Turn: Transdisciplinarity in the Age of the Brain
The Neuroscientific Turn The Neuroscientific Turn Transdisciplinarity in the Age of the Brain Melissa M. Littlefield and Jenell M. Johnson Editors The University of Michigan Press Ann Arbor Copyright © by the University of Michigan 2012 All rights reserved This book may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, including illustrations, in any form (beyond that copying permitted by Sections 107 and 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law and except by reviewers for the public press), without written permission from the publisher. Published in the United States of America by The University of Michigan Press Manufactured in the United States of America c Printed on acid- free paper 2015 2014 2013 2012 4 3 2 1 A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data The neuroscientific turn : transdisciplinarity in the age of the brain / Melissa M. Littlefield and Jenell M. Johnson, editors. p. ; cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978- 0- 472- 11826- 7 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBN 978- 0- 472- 02835- 1 (e- book) I. Littlefield, Melissa M., 1979– II. Johnson, Jenell M., 1978– [DNLM: 1. Neuroscience. WL 100] 612.8— dc23 2012011048 To Susan M. Squier, for opening doors Acknowledgments We are, first and foremost, thankful to our collaborators in this project: the authors who wrote and revised essays for this volume, and who dis- played their willingness to transgress boundaries, to be innovative, and to ask important questions. Our sincere gratitude to those who read part or all of the manuscript: Spencer Schaffner, Justine Murison, Kate Viera, and the anonymous reviewers. We would also like to thank Andrew Shail, Bob Markley, Susan Squier, Hugh Crawford, and Laura Otis for offering advice along the way. Thanks also to Martyn Pickersgill and Ira van Keulen for helping to shape our ideas about popular neuroscience. Finally, thanks to our terrific research assitants, Jessica Mercado and Megan Condis. Beyond these individuals, we are indebted to two organizations: the Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts (SLSA) and the European Neuroscience and Society Network (ENSN). For the past decade, SLSA has provided both the occasion to delve into many of the questions that inform this collection and the audience to engage with them. SLSA was lit- erally our meeting place: where we pored over submitted abstracts among coffee and crumbs in Atlanta, where we presented our ideas for the col- lection on a panel with Sarah Birge, where we pitched the book to Tom Dwyer over lunch in Indianapolis. ENSN has been our source of all things “neuro,” from Neuroschool to fMRI experiments, and the people we have met through this collaborative effort have forever changed our perspec- tives about what it means to work interdisciplinarily—o r better yet, trans- disciplinarily. In particular, we would like to thank Nikolas Rose, Giovanni Frazzetto, Klaus- Peter Lesch, and Andreas Roepsdorff for their insight, for opening their laboratories, and for loosening their purse strings so that we could learn about neuroscience and work with technologies like MRI scanners and PCR. In addition, we want to offer our thanks to Tom Dwyer, Alexa Ducsay, viii • Acknowledgments Christina Milton, and members of the University of Michigan Press’s edi- torial and production staff for producing a beautiful volume. This collec- tion would not be possible without the support of the University of Illinois Research Board and the Department of English. Finally, we would also like to acknowledge and commemorate Susan Leigh Star, who passed away in March 2010. Leigh had agreed to contribute an essay to this volume, and, though the collection is full of wonderful chapters, hers is sorely missed. Melissa would like to thank Jenell for her tireless work, her amazing scholarship, and her sense of humor. This volume was the collaboration of friends long before it was a scholarly collection. Thanks also to Des Fitzgerald, Martin Dietz, Kasper Knudsen, and James Tonks for collabo- rating in all things fMRI; to the graduate students in my Neuroscience and Humanities course for their insightful comments; to John Littlefield, Val- erie Perialas, and Jonathan Littlefield for their tireless support; and, finally, to Isaac Sosnoff and Spencer Schaffner: Σ’αγαπώ. Jenell would like to first thank Melissa: trusted coauthor, meticulous coeditor, and dear friend. Thanks also to Alison Cool, Daniel Stjepanović, Morten Bülow, and my other Würzburg neuroschoolmates; my colleagues at Louisiana State University (especially Lillian Bridwell-B owles) and the University of Wisconsin- Madison (especially Rob Asen, Karma Chávez, Jonathan Gray, Rob Howard, Eunjung Kim, Steve Lucas, Sara McKinnon, Ellen Samuels, Walt Schalick, and Sue Zaeske). My gratitude to Megan Zuelsdorff for countless hours of brain-y conversations and for introduc- ing me to neurotheology many years ago. Thanks to my family: James Johnson, Joy Johnson, Jenna Johnson, Jodi Carreon, and Ryan Carreon, for their constant support. And, finally, my deepest thanks to Michael Xenos, my best critic and biggest fan. Contents Preface: A Neuro- Pivot xi judy illes Introduction: Theorizing the Neuroscientific Turn— Critical Perspectives on a Translational Discipline 1 Melissa M. Littlefield and Jenell M. Johnson Part 1. The Neuroscientific Turn in Context 1. “The Paradise of Non- Experts”: The Neuroscientific Turn of the 1840s United States 29 Justine S. Murison 2. The Performativity of a Historical Brain Event: Revisiting 1517 Strassburg 49 Jameson Kismet Bell 3. The Neural Metaphor 71 Kélina Gotman Part 2. The Neuroscientific Turn in Practice 4. Brainhood, Selfhood, or “Meat with a Point of View”: The Value of Fiction for Neuroscientific Research and Neurological Medicine 89 Sarah Birge 5. Neuroscience and the Quest for God 105 Scott E. Hendrix and Christopher J. May
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