Demonology, neurology, and medicine in Edwardian Britain.

The long-held story of a conflict between demonology and psychiatry is a foundational myth. Nineteenth-century psychiatrists like Charcot and Maudsley pathologized religious experience, and modern historians see this as a professionalization strategy. But these accounts wrongly treat demonology as passive and medicine as active. Examining early twentieth-century demonological literature shows a different picture: fundamentalists and Pentecostalists developed sophisticated models of normal and pathological spiritual experience, drawing on medical sources from germ theory to neurology. The article reveals contested biomedical innovation through points of contact between medical and demonological communities.

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Abstract

The idea of a conflict between demonology and psychiatry has been a foundational myth in the history of medicine. Nineteenth-century alienists such as J.-M. Charcot and Henry Maudsley developed critiques of supernatural phenomena in an attempt to pathologize religious experience. Modern historians have reanalyzed these critiques, representing them as strategies in medical professionalization. These accounts all maintain an oddly bifurcated approach to the perceived conflict, treating demonology, as a passive and unchanging set of practices, while medicine is depicted as an active and aggressive agent. An examination of early twentieth-century demonological literature reveals a very different story. Fundamentalists and Pentecostalists engaged with the problems of conversion and possession, developing sophisticated models of the normal and the pathological in spiritual experience. Their writings drew upon medical and psychiatric sources ranging widely from Pastorian germ theory to Jacksonian neurology. This article explores the points of contact between the medical and demonological communities in order to demonstrate the contested nature of biomedical innovation.