indonesian_open FW: SISC meeting

[Wittman, Leonie]

Sent: Tuesday, 26 April 2005 12:49 PM
To: Wittman, Leonie
Subject: FW: SISC meeting

 

Hi Leonie,

Could you pass this on to the Indonesian group.

 

Cheers,

Melissa


Dear Friends

This is to invite you to attend the third SISC seminar of the year to be
held at 5.30 pm on Friday 29 April. Hans Pols will speak on the subject
of "'The Nature of the Native Mind': A Debate between Colonial
Psychiatrists and Indonesian Physicians in 1924".

Speaker: Hans Pols
Hans Pols is lecturer and Director of the Unit for History and
Philosophy of Science at the University of Sydney. His research focuses
on the history of medicine, psychiatry, and psychology. He is currently
recipient of an ARC fellowship for his research project on War, Trauma
and Rehabilitation: The Army, Psychiatry, and World War II. Over the
last few years, he has investigated the history of medicine, medical
education, and psychiatry in the former Dutch East Indies. 
Topic: "'The Nature of the Native Mind': A Debate between Colonial
Psychiatrists and Indonesian Physicians in 1924". 

Abstract: In 1924, two leading Dutch psychiatrists who worked in the
Dutch East Indies gave talks on their views on the nature of the native
or indigenous mind. Dr. F.H.G. van Loon, who taught psychiatry and
neurology at the medical school (the STOVIA) in Batavia presented his
views to  meeting of the Indisch Genootschap in the Hague. Around the
same time, Dr. P.H.M. Travaglino, medical director of the mental
hospital near Lawang, presented his views to the Politiek-Economische
Bond, a conservative political group, in Surabaya. The views presented
by these psychiatrists were unexceptional, as they closely resembled
theories in colonial psychiatry presented elsewhere. The fierce and
articulate reaction they provoked by Indonesian medical students and
physicians was, however, unique. 
        A small but influential group of Indonesian intellectuals and
physicians, in particular the Society of Indonesian Physicians, took
exception to the views expressed by these psychiatrists. Reactions to
these talks appeared everywhere. In Indonesia, the journal De Taak
published an anonymous article under the title "Psychiatric fascism",
attacking Travaglino. The Journal of Native Physicians also took
exception. The Dutch branch of the Society for Indonesian Physicians
published an extensive rebuttal, elements of which also appeared in
Indonesia Merdeka, the journal of the Perhimpunan Indonesia. This fierce
reaction is indicative of the strong connections between Indonesian
physicians and the Indonesian nationalist movement, which had been
growing steadily since the founding of Budi Utomo in the buildings of
the Jakarta Medical School in 1908. 

Time and Date: 5.30 pm Friday 29 April

Venue: CM05C.02 46g

We look forward to seeing you there.
Steven Drakeley for the SISC Organising Committee

Steven Drakeley PhD
Lecturer Asian History and Politics
BA Honours Coordinator

Office: 61 2 4736 0442
Mobile: 0412 299849
Fax: 61 2 4736 0244

School of Humanities
University of Western Sydney
Building: CG 19
Locked Bag 1797
Penrith South DC NSW 1797 Australia



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