Episode 3: On Location in Berlin
September 28, 2007 by greenmue
On today’s show, we embark on the first of what I hope will be many virtual excursions together. This time we visit Berlin, Germany. This beautiful city is famous for its political and cultural past, but also has a fascinating history in science and medicine.
There is so much to examine, but this episode will focus on Charité — an institution founded as a plague hospital that ended up treating soldiers, training medical students, hosting the founding work of modern pathology, and most recently housing a history of medicine museum — and the Berlin Phonogram Archive, a founding institution for ethnomusicology and a key voice in early twentieth century evolutionary arguments about race.
Host essays: “I Feel Your Pain” and “Evolution in Four-Part Harmony”
- for further reading/viewing/listening:
- Eric Ames, “The Sound of Evolution,” Modernism/Modernity 10 (2003): 297-325.
- Lazare Benaroyo, “Rudolf Virchow and the Scientific Approach to Medicine,” Endeavour 22, no. 3 (1998): 114-116.
- Der Himmel über Berlin, aka Wings of Desire, dir. Wim Wenders (1987)
- Arthur E. Imhof, “The Hospital in the 18th Century: For Whom?” Journal of Social History 10 (1977): 448-470.
- Music! The Berlin Phonogramm-Archiv, 1900-2000 (Wergo, 2000).
- Konrad Obermann, “Materialised Medical History,” The Lancet 359 (2002): 361-362.
- Alexandra Richie, Faust’s Metropolis: A History of Berlin (New York: Carroll & Graf, 1998).
- Londa Schiebinger, “Maria Winkelmann at the Berlin Academy: A Turning Point for Women in Science,” Isis 78 (1987): 174-200.
Audio credits:
All music on this program courtesy of the Podsafe Music Network except where noted.
- Sunburn in Cyprus, History (intro & outro)
- Telemann Trio Berlin, Concerto in D-Dur - Allegro (Vivaldi), Triosonate in D-Dur - Largo (Bach) (courtesy of Magnatune; during historical intro and first essay)
- Happy Gemini 3, Pondering the 10th Planet (transitions)
- RZ-1, Cuckoo-Berliner Remix (courtesy of CC Mixter; following first essay)
- Music! The Berlin Phonogramm-Archiv, 1900-2000 (Wergo, 2000; during second essay)
- “Kham hom,” performed by a theater ensemble from Bangkok in Berlin, 1900
- Eagle song of the Hopi Indians of Arizona, performed in Berlin, 1906
- Xylophone piece of the Bondei, played on the “vilangwi” xylophone, Tanga, Tanganyika, 1903
- Sorbian spinning room song, sung by Christine Marrak, Burg, Germany, 1907
- “Tangiboa,” a death lament sung by Dawidi Anam, German New Guinea, 1928
- Electrix, Berlin am Meer (following second essay)
- Sound effects courtesy of the FreeSound Project:
Other links:
- Berliner Medizinhistoriches Museum (Berlin Medical History Museum)
- Mütter Museum, Philadelphia (pathology collection in the U.S.)
- Bill Squires’ Biology 131 course web site at Texas Lutheran, which includes video projects by his students with their views on the colonization of Mars.
Excellent podcast esp the piece on Virchow was wondering if anyone knows the epimediology of cystic fibrous at this time since we know now that some of the population that survived were absent the chloride channel thus the micro could not enter the cell making the number of people carrying this gene increse in the population just wondering
Ein fohes Neues jahr!
This is a great podcast. Very interesting episode that makes me want to read more on the subject. There’s an excellent novel (which I think has not yet been translated into English), Die Gehilfin (The assistant) by Martin Kluger. It’s about a woman who grows up at the Charité and wants to become a doctor. Instead, she becomes the assistant of Robert Koch, Virchow and others. It all ends quite tragicaly. It’s a very atmospheric novel. Though I cannot judge how accurate his estimation of the circumstances at the time is, I’m sure it was very difficult for women with scientific ambitions in the nineteenth century.