Söderqvist Thomas
Department of History of Medicine, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Bredgade 62, DK-1260 Copenhagen, Denmark.
J Hist Neurosci. 2002 Mar;11(1):38-48. doi: 10.1076/jhin.11.1.38.9099.
This essay surveys the present state of biographical writing in the history of neurology and neuroscience. Individual lives play a significant role in practitioner-historians' narratives, whereas academic historians tend to be more nonindividualistic and a-biographical. Autobiographies by neurologists and neuroscientists, and particularly autobiographical collections, are problematic as an historical genre. Neurobiographies proper are published with several aims in mind: some are written as literary entertainment, others as contributions to a cultural and social history of the neurosciences. Eulogy, panegyrics and commemoration play a great role in neurobiographical writing. Some biographies, finally, are written to provide role-models for young neuroscientists, thus reviving the classical, Plutarchian biographical tradition. Finally, a recent cooperative biography of Charcot is mentioned as an example of how the biographical genre can help overcome the alleged dichotomy between the historiographies of practitioner-historians and academic historians.
本文综述了神经学和神经科学史中传记写作的现状。个人生活在从业历史学家的叙述中扮演着重要角色，而学术历史学家往往更倾向于非个人化且不涉及传记。神经学家和神经科学家的自传，尤其是自传合集，作为一种历史体裁存在问题。专门的神经传记出版有多个目的：有些是作为文学娱乐作品来写，另一些则是为神经科学文化和社会史做出贡献。颂词、赞词和纪念在神经传记写作中发挥着重要作用。最后，有些传记是为年轻神经科学家提供榜样而写，从而复兴了经典的普鲁塔克式传记传统。最后，提到了最近一部关于夏科的合作传记，作为传记体裁如何有助于克服从业历史学家和学术历史学家历史编纂之间所谓二分法的一个例子。
