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2 - Massaging the Town: Phrenological Ordeals and Audiences

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 May 2023

Alexandra Roginski
Affiliation:
Deakin University, Victoria
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Summary

Popular phrenologists lecturing in the Tasman World from 1850 onwards performed head public readings, on stage or in the street. Although bump readers abounded across the Anglosphere, the region and its rapid population growth shaped a particular reception experience. The arrival of an exotic outsider provided a chance for townsfolk, often newly thrown together, to glean an objective – if chaotic – perspective on their community and neighbours. Across this patchwork of settlements, popular phrenology became a tactile lingua franca, with audiences scrutinising the lecturer to catch out humbug through the public ordeal of “trying the bumps”. Whatever the outcome, the town experienced the dual entertainment of theatre and public power-play. Here was a chance to jest about their town and pecking order under the veil of science. Inevitably, phrenologists altered the local climate. But the town always won, and a phrenologist with a crushed reputation could face disaster.

Type
Chapter
Information
Science and Power in the Nineteenth-Century Tasman World
Popular Phrenology in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand
, pp. 60 - 79
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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