Medical Humanities Initiative Work in Progress featuring Prof. James Steintrager
Department: Minor in Medical Humanities
Date and Time: April 18, 2018 | 4:00 PM-5:30 PMEvent Location: Humanities Gateway 1010. Parking is $10 in Mesa Parking Structure
Event Details
Medical Humanities Initiative Work-in-Progress
“Drinking Problems and Drinking Solutions: The Psychology and Poetics of Excessive Drinking in Early Modern England.”
Presented by James Steintrager, Professor of English, UCI School of Humanities
Date: Wednesday, April 18th, 2017
Time: 4:00 – 5:30 p.m.
Location: Humanities Gateway 1010. Parking is $10 in Mesa Parking Structure (directions).
Well before chemical dependency was understood or “alcoholism” was a term—let alone considered a disease—drinking frequently and to excess was thought of as a major social problem in early modern Britain. Yet raising a glass was also entwined with notions of mental and political freedom. In material ranging from drinking poems to psychological treatises, this talk explores how the consumption of wine and spirits went from a patriotic duty during the Civil Wars to an expression of aristocratic license during the Restoration and subsequently emerged as a social ill and scourge of the laboring poor.