Read more
From the 1880s to the 1920s, hunger artists - professional fasters - lived on the fringes of public spectacle and academic experiment. Agustí Nieto-Galan presents the history of this phenomenon as popular urban spectacle and subject of scientific study, showing how hunger artists acted as mediators between the human and the social body. Doctors, journalists, impresarios , artists, and others used them to reinforce their different philosophical views, scientific schools, political ideologies, cultural values, and professional interests. The hunger artists generated heated debates on objectivity and medical pluralism, and fierce struggles over authority, recognition, and prestige. Set on the fringes of the freak show culture of the nineteenth century and the scientific study of physiology laboratories, Nieto-Galan explores the story of the public exhibition of hunger, emaciated bodies, and their enormous impact on the public sphere of their time.
List of contents
Introduction; 1. Geographies; 2. Performances; 3. Experiments; 4. Spirits; 5. Elixirs; 6. Politics; Conclusion; Bibliography; Index.
About the author
Agustí Nieto-Galan is Professor of History of Science at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), ICREA Acadèmia Fellow, and director of the Institut d'Història de la Ciència (iHC) at the UAB.
Summary
From the 1880s to the 1920s, public performances of extreme fasting by caged hunger artists became a very popular source of entertainment. Agustí Nieto-Galan presents the history of this phenomenon as both urban spectacle and subject of scientific study and experiment.
Foreword
The story of the exhibition of hunger, emaciated bodies and their enormous impact in the public sphere around 1900.
