Phrenology was a pseudoscience founded in the early 19th century by Franz Joseph Gall, that attempted to link the shape and size of someone’s skull to a person’s personality and mental abilities. “Studies” in phrenology were often used to justify colonial and racist paradigms of thinking.

The University of Edinburgh houses 7 skulls that were used in phrenological studies, taken from 7 convicts who were executed in colonial India, their heads severed and shipped to Edinburgh. These skulls were labeled as belonging to a “thug” class; Indians were stereotyped as having “unnatural desires” and the skulls were used to justify that criminal behavior was passed down through generations (2). This is one example of the many “phrenological studies” that was born out of racial bias and utilized to justify Caucasians as a superior race.

1. Sizer, N., & Drayton, H. S. (1892). Heads and Faces, and how to Study Them: A Manual of Phrenology and Physiognomy for the People. Fowler & Wells.

2. Writer, S. (2024, January 26). How colonialists used phrenology, a pseudoscience, to justify racism & slavery. Madras Courier. https://madrascourier.com/insight/how-colonialists-used-phrenology-a-pseudoscience-to-justify-racism-slavery/

Tropical medicine often focused on symptom presentation and infectious diseases. Moreover, cultural and racial differences were often cited to explain varying clinical presentations. In this specific diary entry, Smith discusses the establishment of a "lunatic" asylum ward, and varying cases—mania as a result of inflammation in the brain, loss of memory, "nervous apprehension", headaches, "thick speech" and other conditions. Much of Smith's observations align with our understanding of chronic intra-cranial infections (3).

This diary entry showcases the curiosity and involvement of British medical practitioners in colonial India; many of the findings observed by these physicians contributed to the emerging disciplines of Neuroscience and were used to primarily benefit European health and constitution.

3. Jain, S., Murthy, P., & Shankar, S. K. (2001). Neuropsychiatric perspectives from nineteenth-century India: the diaries of Dr Charles I. Smith. History of Psychiatry, 12(48), 459-466.

This image was taken of a psychiatric hospital in Blida Joinville, Algeria. Colonial psychiatric asylums and hospitals first began to be built in the early 19th century; their rise and popularity. These institutions were crucial for maintaining control and discipline of the population; those accused of "disturbing the social order" were often contained in these institutions. Europeans and colonial populations were often housed in distinct institutions to prevent contact between the two; treatments varied between the two as indigenous populations were labeled as more accustomed to a "rudimentary" and "harsh" lifestyle.

Colonial neuropsychiatry was applied in this institutions; clinical observations were used as evidence to justify that indigenous populations inherently carried certain traits that were then pathologized in the medical practice (5).

4. Pavilion of the Administration of the Psychiatric Hospital of Blida-Joinville in 1933. (2009). Wikimedia Commons. Retrieved from https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Frantz_Fanon_hospital_in_1933.jpg.

5. Paul Marquis , « Colonial psychiatry (nineteenth–twentieth century) », Encyclopédie d'histoire numérique de l'Europe [online], ISSN 2677-6588, published on 22/06/20 , consulted on 01/04/2025. Permalink : https://ehne.fr/en/node/12448

In this text, tropical climates are liked to "cerebral congestion", "hysteria', and "insanity"; Europeans were supposedly inherently "more susceptible" due to their biology. Moreover, Johnson argued that prolonged exposure to hot climates weakened the nervous system. An example of a treatment he proposed was ice baths. (7). He was one of the earliest promoters that hot climates lead to neurodegeneration and mental instability.

This artifact provides another dimension examining how studies of neuropsychiatry within the colonial context during the 19th and 20th century often aimed to link environment, race, geography, and climate with various clinical conditions.

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7. Johnson, J. (1827). The influence of tropical climates on European constitutions. Underwood.

8. Harrison, M. (1992). "Tropical Medicine in Nineteenth-Century India". The British Journal for the History of Science. 25 (3): 299–318. doi:10.1017/S0007087400029137. JSTOR 4027255. PMID 11623058.

Mad asylums were utilized frequently throughout British India in line with British imperial advancement. Mental health care at these institutions were used to preserve public order. "Doo-lally" or "crazy" soldiers and citizens were confined. Asylums functioned as key markers of the European civilizing mission.

One of the main diagnoses made by doctors and psychiatrists were of madness and insanity; doctors also developed their own theories, steeped in racism, of how brain structure development and race were linked. For example, one colonial doctor "inferior development of the brain's frontal lobe was common in Africans" (10).

9. The Lawrence Asylum, Ootakamund, Madras Presidency, British India. - Mr. R.F. Chisholm, architect. Walmsley.

10. Keller, R. (2001). Madness and colonization: Psychiatry in the British and French empires, 1800-1962. Journal of social history, 35(2), 295-326.

10. Butts H. F. (1979). Frantz Fanon's contribution to psychiatry: the psychology of racism and colonialism. Journal of the National Medical Association, 71(10), 1015–1018.

The paper discusses that by making these considerations, we can "improve the quality of neurologic research" by "enhancing underlying theory and improving study design and implementation"(11).

I included this as my contemporary artifact as we can see how researchers and healthcare workers are discussing the importance of equity and social determinants of health when it comes to neuroscience research and studying neurological disorders; this is a stark contrast to many of the practices and paradigms discussed in this museum; strides continue to be made to ensure that research is inclusive and ethical.

11. Griffith, D. M., Towfighi, A., Manson, S. M., Littlejohn, E. L., & Skolarus, L. E. (2023). Determinants of inequities in neurologic disease, health, and well-being: The NINDS social determinants of health framework. Neurology, 101(7_Supplement_1), S75-S81.