[Representations of illness in letters addressed to Samuel Hahnemann: gender and historical perspectives].

Abstract

Reading letters depicting perceptions of the body, such as those addressed to the founder of homeopathy, Samuel Hahnemann in the 1830's, is one means to identify how gender influenced the self. Homeopathy produced specific writing situations for the patients. Taking into account the modern concept of privacy, this article demonstrates how patient's letters can express gender hierarchies, namely through different strategies used by patients in order to hide their own distress caused by illness. The expression and representation of experience and discourse are also analysed. In comparing women's and men's writings about their bodies, it is argued that women tend to disclose their knowledge whereas men typically offer names borrowed from different medical discourses in order to describe their illnesses. In short, women refer more often to experience and men to knowledge. One can therefore conclude that the way of representing body perceptions reflects a male or a female self, and suggests distinct constructions of the "nature" of male and female sexes of that time.