Imperialism, race, and therapeutics: the legacy of medicalizing the "colonial body"

J Law Med Ethics. 2008 Fall;36(3):506-16. doi: 10.1111/j.1748-720X.2008.298.x.

Abstract

The era of high colonialism in South Asia coincided with the period when eugenics came to dominate much of the scientific discourse in Europe and America. Such attitudes were naturally transplanted into the colonial world where medical researchers helped to establish a pathological "difference" between Europeans in India and the colonial "Other," thus creating a medical discourse dominated by racial segregated treatment regimes. With the growth of trans-national transfer of scientific knowledge, this colonial "research" began to underpin racially constructed medical practices wherever they occurred.

Publication types

  • Historical Article

MeSH terms

  • Colonialism / history*
  • Culture*
  • Drug Therapy / ethics
  • Drug Therapy / history
  • England
  • History, 19th Century
  • Humans
  • India
  • Prejudice
  • Racial Groups*
  • Therapeutics / ethics
  • Therapeutics / history*