The Right on Lovecraft (was: Beyond the Beltway - the real Americ an Right)

Alec Ramsdell aramsdell at yahoo.com
Tue Jun 19 19:53:49 PDT 2001


Michael Pugliese wrote:


> True that the roots of the word "hysteria" are
> sexist? "Womb sickness"???

That's correct. I was talking with someone the other night working on a history of hysteria, and the accounts she's read have "womb sickness" as something that moved around the body (it could start in the womb and make its way to the neck, for instance). So one sees the beginning of a proliferation of gendered illnesses. This is way before Freud.

Some male-gendered equivalents include neurasthenia and melancholy. What is, and what are the historical origins of neurasthenia?

Alec

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