Table of Contents

Introduction: Insanity, identity and empire
1. Insanity in the ‘age of mobility’: Melbourne and Auckland, 1850s–80s
2. Immigrants, mental health and social institutions: Melbourne and Auckland, 1850s–90s
3. Passing through: narrating patient identities in the colonial hospitals for the insane, 1873–1910
4. White men and weak masculinity: men in the public asylums, 1860s–1900s
5. Insanity and white femininity: women in the public asylums, 1860s–1900s
6. The ‘Others’: inscribing difference in colonial institutional settings
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index

About the Author

Catharine Coleborne is Professor of History in the School of Social Sciences at the University of Waikato, New Zealand

Reviews

'Cathy Coleborne has written a splendid book, one that is especially welcome for its comparative focus, and for its efforts to give us a sense of mental patients' lives in two colonial societies. This is a meticulously researched monograph that is crisply written and full of wonderful details, the whole forming a splendid addition to the burgeoning literature on the history of colonial psychiatry.'
Andrew Scull, Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Science Studies, University of California, San Diego

'Coleborne [has] added important dimensions to the history of insanity in Australia and New Zealand, but even more significant is the depth of insight these works offer historians of immigration. They deserve a wide readership.'
Stephen Garton, University of Sydney, Australian Historical Studies47, no. 2

‘Historians are yet to explore the discursive stretch of madness throughout the British Empire, writes Coleborne. This expansive monograph, bringing together scholarly fields to examine madness thematically at two settler sites of empire, is an important step towards this.’
James Dunk, University of Sydney

‘Insanity, Identity and Empire draws on and extends Coleborne’s previously published works about institutional confinement.’
Ann Westmore, University of Melbourne , Health and History 18/2

‘The book adds to a growing body of historical literature on disability and madness and, in particular, research on migration, disability, and madness.’
Natalie Spagnuolo, York University, Toronto, H-Disability (January 2018)
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