Paths to Rehabilitation? The Possibilities of Treatment

Skinner, Patricia

doi:10.1057/978-1-137-54439-1_7

Cited by 2 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…28 As we shall see, however, she does give Nicephorus's story a happy ending, retired and apparently reconciled to his lack of sight. 29 A third blinding, of her husband's father Bryennius, is referred to only obliquely; she refers the reader to her husband's own history for the details, but repeatedly absolves Alexius of involvement. 30 If Anna's Alexius was reluctant to blind, his repeated use of threat, rumor and simulation suggests nevertheless that-to Anna at least-resort to such tactics could be justified in times of war.…”

Section: Case Study: Byzantine Staringmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ways of Seeing: Staring at and Representing Disfigurement

Skinner

2016

Living With Disfigurement in Early Medieval Europe

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Vision lies at the heart of all medieval responses to disfigurement and difference: modern campaigners for facial equality argue that whilst the visual impact of a different face might be unavoidable, a negative response is almost always conditioned by socialization, that is, prejudice is learned, not inborn. A child growing up with visibly-different parents may realize that difference quite early in life, but will not make value judgments until it witnesses the responses of peers and/or their parents. In medieval culture, the assumption that a disfigured or scarred face might be seen and cause shame underpins the compensation demanded of the perpetrator of the injury (payments which, as we have seen, might continue long after the actual injury itself). The flipside, the exhibition of the judiciallymarked, did not work without an audience to understand the meaning of such marking. Yet the potential for sympathy, rather than derision, from onlookers suggests that the meaning of such marking was far from stable. It clearly motivated some rulers, for example, to disfigure and then seclude their "treacherous" subjects. The visible bramble scratch on the face singled out Helmstan as a cattle rustler, a branded face marked the repeat Lombard thief, noseless hostages were a sign of Cnut's ruthlessness. But difference might also attract attention because of attempts to conceal it: Notker the Stammerer tells the strange tale of a young man who, ashamed of his red hair and lacking a cap to cover it, attended Mass balancing one of his boots on top of his head. The bishop, annoyed at the lack of respect inherent in not removing headgear in church (and this is Notker's point

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Section: Case Study: Byzantine Staringmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ways of Seeing: Staring at and Representing Disfigurement

Skinner

2016

Living With Disfigurement in Early Medieval Europe

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“…Thus Thomas Becket from beyond the grave assisted Ailward of Westoning, restoring the man's eyesight and testicles after their mutilation, and the miracles of St Wulfstan of Worcester give a lengthy account of the mutilation, and subsequent cure by Wulfstan (d.1095), of Thomas of Elderfield, wrongly blinded and castrated in 1217. 75 Both of these episodes are well-known and have been discussed in numerous contexts, particularly the sensationalism with which the mutilations themselves are presented: heightened language, the horror of Thomas of Elderfield's eyeballs and testicles being used as footballs. 76 Rather neglected, by contrast, is the careful and possibly equallysuspect account of the moment when Ailward realized that he could see, for embedded in the text here is an account of the care that had been applied to his now-empty eye-sockets.…”

Section: Hagiographic Textsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Introduction: Writing and Reading About Medieval Disfigurement

Skinner

2016

Living With Disfigurement in Early Medieval Europe

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Introduction: Writing and Reading About Medieval Disfigurement "Probably from a social point of view, a simple facial disfigurement is the worst disability of all-the quickly-suppressed flicker of revulsion is, I am certain, quite shattering." 1 This statement, made by a person reflecting on his own social challenges living as a muscular dystrophy sufferer in in the 1960s, expresses succinctly the horror that facial disfigurement holds for modern observers, and its perceived place in the spectrum of social disability. Whilst modern medicine has in the intervening five decades largely perfected the process of "improving" the appearance of the disfigured face through prosthetics, surgery, skin grafts and sophisticated cosmetics, the aesthetic and technical genius of some modern medical prosthetics units is often up against deep-rooted psychological damage in the subject, which finds its expression in dissatisfaction with the "new" facial features, and may even lead to outright rejection. 2 The ingrained sense of disgust that facial damage is said to provoke in its victims and observers alike is even the subject of psychological studies, where the assumption that an impaired face will evoke such a response is taken as a given fact. 3 William Ian Miller puts it succinctly: "There are few things that are more unnerving and disgust evoking than our partibility... severed hands, ears, heads, gouged eyes...Severability is unnerving no matter what part is being detached." 4 The high-profile, modern cases of individuals who have "fought back" from severe facial damage, whether through burns, acid attacks or mutilation, have gone some way toward challenging such attitudes; and as historians reflect on the centenary of the destruction and loss of life inflicted in World War I, the facial disfigurement of returning soldiers from two World

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Paths to Rehabilitation? The Possibilities of Treatment

Cited by 2 publications

References 7 publications

Ways of Seeing: Staring at and Representing Disfigurement

Ways of Seeing: Staring at and Representing Disfigurement

Introduction: Writing and Reading About Medieval Disfigurement

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