"Visceral Consciousness": The Gut-Brain Axis in Victorian Sleep and Sleeplessness in Britain and America, 1850-1914
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"Visceral Consciousness" : The Gut-Brain Axis in Victorian Sleep and Sleeplessness in Britain and America, 1850-1914. / Hussey, Kristin D.
In: Bulletin of the History of Medicine, Vol. 95, No. 3, 2021, p. 350-378.Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - "Visceral Consciousness"
T2 - The Gut-Brain Axis in Victorian Sleep and Sleeplessness in Britain and America, 1850-1914
AU - Hussey, Kristin D.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - Sleeplessness was a quotidian yet challenging problem for medical practitioners in Britain and America in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. While physiologists endeavored to unravel the secrets of sleep by examining the brain, in the clinic doctors looked to the gut as a site through which sleeplessnesswas both caused and cured. This article explores the gut-brain axis in medical literature on sleep and sleep loss in this period. It argues that despite the lack of a coherent understanding of the gut-brain connection, the digestive system was central to how physiologists and clinicians approached sleeplessness. It employsVictorian physician Joseph Mortimer Granville’s (1833–1900) concept of “visceral consciousness” to better understand the varied and often contradictory explanatory constellations that emerged to elucidate the role of digestion in sleeplessness.
AB - Sleeplessness was a quotidian yet challenging problem for medical practitioners in Britain and America in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. While physiologists endeavored to unravel the secrets of sleep by examining the brain, in the clinic doctors looked to the gut as a site through which sleeplessnesswas both caused and cured. This article explores the gut-brain axis in medical literature on sleep and sleep loss in this period. It argues that despite the lack of a coherent understanding of the gut-brain connection, the digestive system was central to how physiologists and clinicians approached sleeplessness. It employsVictorian physician Joseph Mortimer Granville’s (1833–1900) concept of “visceral consciousness” to better understand the varied and often contradictory explanatory constellations that emerged to elucidate the role of digestion in sleeplessness.
KW - Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences
KW - digestion
KW - physiology
KW - history
KW - sleep
KW - insomnia
U2 - 10.1353/bhm.2021.0033
DO - 10.1353/bhm.2021.0033
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 34924437
VL - 95
SP - 350
EP - 378
JO - Bulletin of the History of Medicine
JF - Bulletin of the History of Medicine
SN - 0007-5140
IS - 3
ER -
ID: 281570468