Medical Writing in Early Modern English

A new view on the evolution of the language of medicine based on a large electronic corpus of medical texts.

Irma Taavitsainen (Edited by), Päivi Pahta (Edited by)

9781107654556, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 17 April 2014

322 pages, 43 b/w illus. 13 tables
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.7 cm, 0.43 kg

'… brings together the scholarship of both medical historians and historical linguists … provides multiple applications as a foundation to build upon and a research model for teachers of historical linguistics, and some applications as reference material for instructors of the History of the English Language.' Christina Francis, Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Teaching (SMART)

Medical writing tells us a great deal about how the language of science has developed in constructing and communicating knowledge in English. This volume provides a new perspective on the evolution of the special language of medicine, based on the electronic corpus of Early Modern English Medical Texts, containing over two million words of medical writing from 1500 to 1700. The book presents results from large-scale empirical research on the new materials and provides a more detailed and diversified picture of domain-specific developments than any previous book. Three introductory chapters provide the sociohistorical, disciplinary and textual frame for nine empirical studies, which address a range of key issues in a wide variety of medical genres from fresh angles. The book is useful for researchers and students within several fields, including the development of special languages, genre and register analysis, (historical) corpus linguistics, historical pragmatics, and medical and cultural history.

1. An interdisciplinary approach to medical writing in early modern English Päivi Pahta and Irma Taavitsainen
2. Medical texts in 1500–1700 and the corpus of early modern English medical texts Irma Taavitsainen, Peter Murray Jones, Päivi Pahta, Turo Hiltunen, Ville Marttila, Maura Ratia, Carla Suhr and Jukka Tyrkkö
3. Medical literacies and medical culture in early modern England Peter Murray Jones
4. Verbs of knowing: discoursive practices in early modern vernacular medicine Turo Hiltunen and Jukka Tyrkkö
5. Defining in early modern English medical texts Rod McConchie and Anne Curzan
6. Dissemination and appropriation of medical knowledge: humoral theory in early modern medical writing and lay texts Irma Taavitsainen
7. Code-switching in early modern English medical writing Päivi Pahta
8. New arguments for new audiences: a corpus-based analysis of interpersonal strategies in early modern English medical recipes Ville Marttila
9. Efficacy phrases in early modern English medical recipes Martti Mäkinen
10. Medical pamphlets: controversy and advertising Maura Ratia and Carla Suhr
11. The development of specialized discourse in the Philosophical Transactions Maurizio Gotti
12. The expression of stance in early (1665–1712) publications of the Philosophical Transactions and other contemporary medical prose: innovations in a pioneering discourse Bethany Gray, Douglas Biber and Turo Hiltunen.

Subject Areas: History of medicine [MBX], Literary studies: c 1500 to c 1800 [DSBD], Historical & comparative linguistics [CFF], Language: history & general works [CBX]