Legacies and responsibilities: Edinburgh's anatomy collections
Resource type
Lecture
Creator (person)
Malcolm, MacCallum
Anderson, Nicole
Abstract
Edinburgh’s Anatomy collections have global importance, and are the legacy of more than three centuries of intellectual effort directed towards understanding the body in sickness and health. The values and methods of the medical school have always reflected those of the society around it.
This public talk will focus on the contents of those collections, and the ways in which they have evolved over the centuries as the values and the priorities of the medical school changed. It will explore the question of how often medicine and medical science have got things wrong (e.g. Phrenology) and how that influenced what went into the collection, but also how often the collections have been the foundation for new understandings of the body that have gone on to revolutionise the way we understand and influence health, wellbeing, and knowledge of different populations.
The Anatomy Department has a legal and ethical duty towards the care of these collections, and this lecture will explore the responsibilities of good stewardship in the 21st century.
Malcolm MacCallum is well-placed as the curator of the museum to tease out these questions. Nicole Anderson, whose PhD explored the subtleties and challenges of repatriation of human remains within the anatomical collections gathered during the colonial period, is well placed to offer a nuanced perspective on the role and responsibility of a modern curator.
Event title
Publisher
University of Edinburgh
Rights statement
In Copyright