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 Printable version |
Benedict‐Augustin Morel‘s theory of degeneration |
l'Information Psychiatrique. Volume 80, Number 1, 43-9, Janvier 2004, HISTOIRE DE LA PSYCHIATRIE
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 Résumé
Article gratuit
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Author(s) : Joëlle Haupert, Yves De Smet, Jean‐Marie Spautz |
Summary : Sources and influences. Benedict‐Augustin Morel (1809‐1873) is the father of the "theory of degeneration", "early dementia" and "emotional delirium", three concepts which, at the turning point of the 19
th and 20
th centuries, were to allow the French alienists to counter the German
Nervenärzte. By means of a unique etiopathogenics ("hereditary degeneration"), the "theory of degeneration" set out to explain the unicity of mental alienation, deriving its roots less from 19
th century psychiatric theories than from, on the one hand, the thinking of Saint Augustin and Rousseau and, on the other, the Christian and Social Democratic movements of the Revolution of 1848. It was thus able to flourish during the Second Empire and its influence was felt on Magnan, Krafft‐Ebing, Galton Lombroso and Zola alike. |
Keywords : B.A. Morel, degeneration, heredity, mental alienation, history. |
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