"La manie d'ecrire": psychology, auto-observation, and case history

Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences
Matt T Reed

Abstract

This essay examines the modern psychiatric case study as a scientific method and as a genre of writing about the self. As psychological discourse became a privileged language of selfhood at the fin de siècle, the penultimate signifier of the self came to be found in the realm of sexuality, in the particular contours of an individual's sexual desire. The investigative tool used to uncover these secrets of identity was the case history. This article concerns an influential project of sexual research based on "auto-observations"-autobiographical patient narratives-conducted by Dr. Georges Saint-Paul, who published under the inverted pseudonym "Laupts." The article focuses on the central autobiography of his collection, the "roman d'un inverti," and related sexological literature to suggest how this emphasis on patient stories in psychiatric writing engendered new narrative possibilities for doctors and patients alike. Putting patient stories at the center of psychiatric investigation created a new relationship between patient and doctor, observation and diagnosis, subject and discourse. The tools of psychological observation simultaneously placed a subject's confession more firmly at the center of the investigation and made it mor...Continue Reading

References

Jul 18, 2000·Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences·T Gelfand
Jul 18, 2000·Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences·J Carroy, R Plas
May 9, 2001·Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences·S Nicolas, A Charvillat
Jun 6, 2008·History of the Human Sciences·M T Reed

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