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ABSTRACT
This paper focuses on nineteenth-century theories according to which intellectual disabilities find expression in physical impairment. Such theories became widespread in Switzerland due to the growing interest in a condition then called ‘cretinism’ – a specific form of ‘idiocy’ in the course of which mental and physical disintegration went hand in hand. The first institution for ‘cretinic’ children initially achieved considerable fame. However, it eventually failed completely, leading to a loss of interest in ‘cretinism’. Interestingly, the specific body–mind connection that was associated with ‘cretinism’ did not vanish; instead, it became important in the context of another intellectual disability that gained attention after the mid-nineteenth century: ‘idiocy’. Physical aspects became the main criteria for identifying ‘idiotic’ children in order to allocate them to special educational measures. The paper argues that the connection of an ‘abnormal’ mind to an impaired body allowed for the popularisation of knowledge regarding ‘idiotic’ children.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 [Ignaz] Troxler, ‘Der Cretinismus und seine Formen, als endemische Menschenentartung in unserm Vaterlande’ [Cretinism and Its Forms, as Endemic Degeneration in Our Fatherland], Denkschriften der Allgemeinen Schweizerischen Gesellschaft für die Gesammten Naturwissenschaften 1, no. 2 (1833): 178–9.
2 See Johannes Gstach, Kretinismus und Blödsinn: Zur fachlich-wissenschaftlichen Entdeckung und Konstruktion von Phänomenen der geistig-mentalen Auffälligkeit zwischen 1780 und 1900 und deren Bedeutung für Fragen der Erziehung und Behandlung [Cretinism and Stupidity: On the Disciplinary Discovery and the Construction of Phenomena of Mental Abnormality between 1780 and 1900 and Their Significance for Education and Therapy] (Bad Heilbrunn: Klinkhardt, 2015), 104–92.
3 Hermann Demme, Ueber endemischen Kretinismus: Rede zur Feier des Jahrestages der Eröffnung der Hochschule in Bern [On Endemic Cretinism: Address in Celebration of the University of Bern’s Anniversary] (Bern: Chr. Fischer, 1840), 26.
4 See, e.g., ibid., 12–13.
5 Even though the Roman poet Juvenal’s words were originally intended to be satirical, the saying mens sana in corpore sano has often been referred to in educational contexts. See Friedrich Schweitzer, ‘In einem gesunden Körper wohnt ein gesunder Geist? Oder: Sind nasse Füsse wirklich gesund?’ [A Healthy Mind in a Healthy Body? Or: Are Wet Feet Really Healthy?], Mythen – Irrtümer – Unwahrheiten: Essays über das ‘Valsche’ in der Pädagogik, ed. Hans-Ulrich Grunder (Bad Heilbrunn: Julius Klinkhardt, 2017), 13–17.
6 Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile: Or, On Education [1762] (Auckland: The Floating Press, 2009), 45. However, physical impairment can be interpreted as having the potential for better education. This notion is embodied today in the image of the slender, pale-faced, spectacled, highly educated science nerd. To name a historic example, at the beginning of the twentieth century, the French ophthalmologist Émile Javal noted that short-sighted children stayed in school, whereas their ‘normal’ sighted peers left school early to work in agriculture, industry and trade. See Émile Javal, Physiologie de la lecture et de l’écriture [Physiology of Reading and Writing] (Paris: Félix Alcan, 1905), 188. Unsurprisingly, glasses became a symbol of intellectuality, not only because exhaustive reading damages the eyes but also because short-sighted people spend more time reading instead of doing other (physical) labour.
7 See Rebecca Noel, ‘“No Wonder They Are Sick, and Die of Study”: European Fears for the Scholarly Body and Health in New England Schools before Horace Mann’, Paedagogica Historica 54, no. 1–2 (2018): 134–53.
8 See, e.g., Troxler, Cretinismus und seine Formen, 179, 198; Demme, Ueber endemischen Kretinismus, 31–2.
9 See Edgar Miller, ‘Mental Retardation: Clinical Section – Part I’, in A History of Clinical Psychiatry: The Origin and History of Psychiatric Disorders, ed. German Barrios and Roy Porter (London: Athlone, 1995), 219; Carlo Wolfisberg, ‘Die Heilung des Kretinismus: Eine folgenreiche (Miss)-Erfolgsstory aus den Alpen’ [The Healing of Cretinism: A Momentous Story of (Ill) Success from the Alps], Historische Anthropologie 11, no. 2 (2003): 199–200, 204–5; Murray K. Simpson, Modernity and the Appearance of Idiocy: Intellectual Disability as a Regime of Truth (Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press, 2014), 51.
10 See Paul K. Longmore and Lauri Umansky, ‘Introduction: Disability History: From the Margins to the Mainstream’, in The New Disability History: American Perspectives, ed. Paul K. Longmore and Lauri Umansky (New York: New York University Press, 2001), 1–29.
11 See, e.g., James W. Trent, Inventing the Feeble Mind: A History of Mental Retardation in the United States (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994); David Wright and Anne Digby, eds., From Idiocy to Mental Deficiency: Historical Perspectives on People with Learning Disabilities (London: Routledge, 1996); Mark Jackson, The Borderland of Imbecility: Medicine, Society and the Fabrication of the Feeble Mind in Late Victorian and Edwardian England (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2000); Patrick McDonagh, Idiocy: A Cultural History (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2009); C. F. Goodey, A History of Intelligence and ‘Intellectual Disability’: The Shaping of Psychology in Early Modern Europe (Farnham: Ashgate, 2011); Gerald V. O’Brien: Framing the Moron: The Social Construction of Feeble-Mindedness in the American Eugenic Era (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2013).
12 Patrick Devlieger et al., ‘Visualising Disability in the Past’, Paedagogica Historica 44, no. 6 (2008): 747. See also Catherine J. Kudlick, ‘Disability History: Why We Need Another “Other”’, American Historical Review 108, no. 3 (2003): 763–93.
13 Patrick McDonagh, C. F. Goodey and Tim Stainton, ‘Introduction: The Emergent Critical History of Intellectual Disability’, in Intellectual Disability: A Conceptual History, 1200–1900, ed. Patrick McDonagh, C. F. Goodey and Tim Stainton (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2018), 1.
14 Ibid., 2.
15 Ibid., 4.
16 Demme, Ueber endemischen Kretinismus, 49.
17 See J[ohann Jakob] Guggenbühl, ‘Hülfsruf aus den Alpen, zur Bekämpfung des schrecklichen Cretinismus’ [Cry for Help from the Alps, on Combating the Terrible Cretinism], Bibliothek der Neuesten Weltkunde 1 (1840): 200.
18 See Hergé, Les aventures de Tintin: Le trésor de Rackham le Rouge [The Adventures of Tintin: Red Rackham’s Treasure], rev. ed. (1945; repr., Tournai: Casterman, 1973), 20.
19 Clive H. Church and Randolph C. Head, A Concise History of Switzerland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 186. See also Yvonne Boerlin-Brodbeck, ‘Das Bild der Alpen’ [The Image of the Alps], Die Erfindung der Schweiz 1848–1948: Bildentwürfe einer Nation (Zürich: Schweizerisches Landesmuseum, 1998), 76–87; Aurel Schmidt, Die Alpen: Eine Schweizer Mentalitätsgeschichte [The Alps: A Swiss History of Mentality] (Frauenfeld: Huber, 2011). In addition to ‘cretinism’, another affliction associated with Switzerland – but in a more positive way – was homesickness, also called ‘the Swiss disease’. See Christian Schmid, ‘Heimweh’ [Homesickness], Historisches Lexikon der Schweiz, vol. 6 (Basel: Schwabe 2007), 233–4.
20 See Guggenbühl, Hülfsruf aus den Alpen.
21 See, e.g., ibid., 192, 194–6.
22 See, e.g., Martin S. Staum, Labeling People: French Scholars on Society, Race and Empire, 1815–1848 (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2003); Michael Hagner, Geniale Gehirne [Ingenious Brains] (Göttingen: Wallstein Verlag, 2004); Sherrie L. Lyons, Species, Serpents, Spirits, and Skulls: Science at the Margins in the Victorian Age (Albany: New York Press, 2009).
23 See, e.g., Ellis Shookman, ‘Wissenschaft, Mode, Wunder: Über die Popularität von Lavaters Physiognomik’ [Science, Fashion, Miracle: On the Popularity of Lavater’s Physiognomy], in Das Antlitz Gottes im Antlitz des Menschen: Zugänge zu Johann Caspar Lavater, ed. Karl Pestalozzi and Horst Weigelt (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1994), 243–52; Hagner, Geniale Gehirne, 100–1; Nicole Becker, ‘Von der Schädellehre zu den modernen Neurowissenschaften: Ansichten über den Einfluss von Erziehung auf die Gehirnentwicklung’ [From Craniology to Modern Neurosciences: Views on the Influence of Education on Brain Development], Jahrbuch für Historische Bildungsforschung 10 (2004): 136–7.
24 Staum, Labeling People, 52.
25 Johann Jakob Guggenbühl, Briefe über den Abendberg und die Heilanstalt für Cretinismus [Letters on the Abendberg and the Sanatorium for the Treatment of Cretinism] (Zürich: Orell, Füssli und Comp., 1846), 85.
26 Pieter Verstraete, ‘The Taming of Disability: Phrenology and Bio-Power on the Road to the Destruction of Otherness in France (1800–60)’, History of Education 34, no. 2 (2005): 131.
27 See Guggenbühl, Hülfsruf aus den Alpen, 200–1.
28 Ibid., 201.
29 See Carlo Wolfisberg, Heilpädagogik und Eugenik: Zur Geschichte der Heilpädagogik in der deutschsprachigen Schweiz (1800–1950) [Special Education and Eugenics: On the History of Special Education in German-Speaking Switzerland (1800–1950)] (Zürich: Chronos, 2002), 56; Wolfisberg, Heilung des Kretinismus, 197; Gstach, Kretinismus und Blödsinn, 108.
30 See [Johann Jakob] Guggenbühl, ‘Bericht über die Cretinenanstalt auf dem Abendberg’ [Report on the Sanatorium for the Treatment of Cretinism on the Abendberg], Verhandlungen der Schweizerischen Naturforschenden Gesellschaft 29 (1844): 113–20; [Johann Jakob] Guggenbühl, Extracts from the First Report of the Institution on the Abendberg, near Interlachen, Switzerland; for the Cure of Cretins, trans. W. Twining (London: Harrison and Co., Printers, St. Martin’s Lane [1845]); Johann Jakob Guggenbühl, Die Heilung und Verhütung des Cretinismus und ihre neuesten Fortschritte: Mittheilungen an die schweizerische naturforschende Gesellschaft [Healing and Prevention of Cretinism and Their Latest Progress: Report to the Swiss Society of Natural Scientists] (Bern: Huber & Comp., 1853).
31 Guggenbühl, Heilung und Verhütung, 82.
32 Animal magnetism is presumed to be an intangible or mysterious force that is said to influence human beings. The term was used by the German physician Franz Anton Mesmer (1734–1815) to explain the hypnotic procedure he used in the treatment of patients. According to Mesmer, animal magnetism could be activated by any magnetised object and manipulated by any trained person. Disease was the result of ‘obstacles’ in the flow of fluid through the body, and these obstacles could be broken by ‘crises’ (trance states) that restored harmony to personal fluid flow. ‘Mesmer, Franz Anton’, The New Encyclopaedia Britannica, vol. 8 (Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2010), 46–7.
33 See Guggenbühl, Heilung und Verhütung, 83–96.
34 Ibid., 91.
35 Ibid., 92, 96.
36 Ibid., 96.
37 Guggenbühl, Extracts from the First Report, 5–6.
38 See Gstach, Kretinismus und Blödsinn, 127–8.
39 Lorraine Daston, ‘The Empire of Observation, 1600–1800’, in Histories of Scientific Observation, ed. Lorraine Daston and Elizabeth Lunbeck (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2011), 104.
40 Franz Merke, Geschichte und Ikonographie des endemischen Kropfes und Kretinismus [The History and Iconography of Endemic Goitre and Cretinism] (Bern: Huber, 1971), 239; Miller, Mental Retardation, 219.
41 See Leonora Gaussen, The Wonders of the Abendberg (Bern: n.p., 1857).
42 Merke, Geschichte und Ikonographie, 239; Wolfisberg, Heilpädagogik und Eugenik, 58; Wolfisberg, Heilung des Kretinismus, 198–9.
43 Miller, Mental Retardation, 219; Wolfisberg, Heilpädagogik und Eugenik, 57–8; Wolfisberg, Heilung des Kretinismus, 202–4; Gstach, Kretinismus und Blödsinn, 129–31, 136–7, 148–9, 159.
44 See Wolfisberg, Heilung des Kretinismus, 206; Gstach, Kretinismus und Blödsinn, 159.
45 See É[tienne] Esquirol, Des maladies mentales: Considérée sous les rapports médicale, hygiénique et médicolégal [Mental Illnesses: On the Basis of Medical, Hygienic and Medico-Legal Reports] (Paris: J.-B. Baillière, 1838).
46 See Jean Lelièvre, L’enfant inefficient intellectuel [The Intellectually Inefficient Child] (Rosny-sous-Bois: Bréal, 2005), 182–3.
47 See Michèle Hofmann, ‘Schwachbegabt, schwachsinnig, blödsinnig – Kategorisierung geistig beeinträchtigter Kinder um 1900’ [Moronic, Imbecile, Stupid – Categorising Intellectually Disabled Children around 1900], Bildungsgeschichte: International Journal for the Historiography of Education 7, no. 2 (2017): 142–56. For the development of similar categories in other countries see, e.g., Trent, Inventing the Feeble Mind, 16–23; Annemieke van Drenth, ‘Sensorial Experiences and Childhood: Nineteenth-Century Care for Children with Idiocy’, Paedagogica Historica 51, no. 5 (2015): 569–70; Jason Ellis, ‘Early Educational Exclusion: “Idiotic” and “Imbecilic” Children, Their Families, and the Toronto Public School System, 1914–1950’, Canadian Historical Review 98, no. 3 (2017): 489–91.
48 Joh[ann] Hofstetter-Bader, ‘Einleitung’ [Introduction], in Verhandlungen der I. Schweizerischen Konferenz für das Idiotenwesen, ed. Ad[olf] Ritter (Zürich: S. Höhr, 1889), 1.
49 Adolf Ritter, ‘Eröffnungsworte des Präsidenten zur I. Schweizerischen Conferenz für das Idiotenwesen in Zürich, 3. Juni 1889’ [Opening Address by the President of the First Swiss Conference on Idiocy], in Verhandlungen der I. Schweizerischen Konferenz für das Idiotenwesen, ed. Ad[olf] Ritter (Zürich: S. Höhr, 1889), 4.
50 Ibid., 7.
51 See ibid., 9.
52 See ibid., 6.
53 See ibid., 10–12.
54 See Michèle Hofmann, ‘Ein schwacher Geist in einem schwachen Körper? Popularisierung medizinischen Wissens über geistige Schwäche im ausgehenden 19. und beginnenden 20. Jahrhundert in der Schweiz’ [A Weak Mind in a Weak Body? Popularisation of Medical Knowledge on Mental Weakness in the Late 19th and the Beginning of the 20th Centuries in Switzerland], Spurensuche: Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Erwachsenenbildung und Wissenschaftspopularisierung 27 (forthcoming, 2019).
55 See, e.g., Adolf Ritter, ‘Über den gegenwärtigen Stand des Idiotenwesens in der Schweiz’ [On the Current State of Care for Idiots in Switzerland], in Verhandlungen der II. Schweizerischen Konferenz für das Idiotenwesen, ed. K[onrad] Auer and F[riedrich] Kölle (Aarau: H. R. Sauerländer, 1899), 16.
56 See, e.g., J[ohann] J[akob] Amstein, ‘Hat der Staat die Pflicht, für Schwach- und Blödsinnige zu sorgen?’ [Is It the State’s Responsibility to Care for Imbecile and Stupid People?], in Vorträge über die Idiotenfrage (Zürich: J. Schabelitz, 1880), 12–14; Konrad Auer, ‘Wie wird für die körperlich und geistig zurückgebliebenen, insbesondere für die schwachsinnigen Kinder unseres Vaterlandes in ausreichendem Masse gesorgt?’ [Are the Physically and Mentally Retarded Children, Especially the Imbecile Children, of Our Fatherland Well Enough Cared for?], Schweizerische Pädagogische Zeitschrift 6, no. 4 (1896): 150–2.
57 Amstein, Schwach- und Blödsinnige, 26. See also R[udolf] F[riedrich] Fetscherin, Bericht an die Direction des Innern des Kantons Bern über die Zählung und Statistik der Geisteskranken und Idioten im Kanton Bern vom Jahre 1871 [Report to the Direction of Internal Affairs of the Canton of Bern on the Survey of Insane and Idiotic People in the Canton of Bern in 1871] ([Bern]: n.p., [1872]), 15; A[lfred] Ulrich, ‘Der Schwachsinn bei Kindern’ [Imbecility in the Case of Children], in Verhandlungen der IV. Schweizerischen Konferenz für das Idiotenwesen, ed. C[onrad] Auer, K[arl] Kölle and H[ermann] Graf (Glarus: Buchdruck Glarner Nachrichten, 1903), 51.
58 See, e.g., H[ermann] A[dalbert] Wildermuth, ‘Die Pathologie der Idiotie’ [The Pathology of Idiocy], in Verhandlungen der I. Schweizerischen Konferenz für das Idiotenwesen, ed. Ad[olf] Ritter (Zürich: S. Höhr, 1889), 14, 30; Anleitungen für das Lehrpersonal, um die in das Alter der Schulpflicht getretenen Kinder auf das Vorhandensein geistiger oder körperlicher Gebrechen zu untersuchen [Instructions for Teachers to Examine the Mental and Physical Health of Children Reaching School Age] ([Bern]: [Neukomm & Zimmermann], [1899]), 2.
59 See U[lrich] Graf, ‘Tabellen über Bestand und Entwicklung der Fürsorge für Geistesschwache’ [Tables on the Current State and the Development of Care for the Feebleminded], in Fürsorge für die anormale Jugend in der Schweiz in ihren eidgenössischen und kantonalen Gesetzen, Verordnungen, Reglementen und deren Schulen, Erziehungs- und Pflegeanstalten, ed. Emil Hasenfratz (n.p.: Selbstverlag der Gesellschaft für Erziehung und Pflege Geistesschwacher, 1916), 60–2; E[mil] Hasenfratz, ‘Tabelle I: Die schweizerischen Erziehungs- und Pflegeanstalten für Geistesschwache’ [Table I: Swiss Institutions for the Feebleminded], in Verhandlungen der IX. Schweizerischen Konferenz für Erziehung und Pflege Geistesschwacher, ed. E[mil] Hasenfratz and U[lrich] Graf ([Herisau]: n.p. [1913]), n.p.; U[lrich] Graf and H[einrich] Plüer, ‘Die Entwicklung des Hilfsschulwesens’ [The Development of the Special School System], in Verhandlungen der XII. Schweizerischen Konferenz für Erziehung und Pflege Geistesschwacher, ed. K[arl] Jauch ([Zürich]: Selbstverlag des Vorstandes der Gesellschaft [für Erziehung und Pflege Geistesschwacher] [1921]), 71–3.
60 See Esquirol, Maladies mentales, vol. 2, 289, 304–39.
61 ‘Die Rettung der Cretinen auf dem Abendberg durch Hrn. Dr. Guggenbühl’ [The Salvation of the Cretinic on the Abendberg by Dr Guggenbühl], Volksschulblatt 4, no. 10 (1857): 122. See also Guggenbühl, Heilung und Verhütung, 7–9, 41.
62 See, e.g., Hugo Henne, ‘Ueber Wesen und Behandlung der Geistesstörungen und die Bildung eines Hülfsvereins für genesende Gemüthskranke’ [On the Nature and Treatment of Lunacy and the Establishment of a Benevolent Society for Recovering Emotionally Disturbed People], Schweizerische Zeitschrift für Gemeinnützigkeit 9 (1870): 64–86; Wildermuth, Pathologie der Idiotie, 13–31; [Johann Kaufmann], ‘Fürsorge für schwachsinnige Kinder’ [Care for Imbecile Children], Schweizerische Zeitschrift für Gemeinnützigkeit 35 (1896): 412–27.
63 Stephen Jay Gould, The Mismeasure of Man, rev. ed. (London: Penguin Books, 1996), 142–4. Older theories had ranked human groups based on the size and shape of their skulls, assuming that these measured data determine brain size, which in turn determines intelligence and the capacity for moral behaviour. See ibid., 105–41.
64 See, e.g., Arthur Herman, The Idea of Decline in Western History (New York: Free Press, 1997).
65 See Jonas Menne, ‘Lombroso redivivus?’ Biowissenschaften, Kriminologie und Kriminalpolitik von 1876 bis in die Gegenwart [Lombroso redivivus? Biosciences, Criminology and Criminal Policy from 1876 to the Present] (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2017), 18–22.
66 See ibid., 19.
67 See, e.g., Anstalt zur Hoffnung Basel, ‘Zeugniss zu Handen der Anstalt zur Hoffnung in Basel 1883‘ [Certificate for the Attention of the Institution ‘zur Hoffnung’ in Basel], file V BS 2268, Swiss National Library; Martinstiftung Erlenbach-Zürich, ‘Fragebogen für die Aufnahme der Kinder in die Martinstiftung in Erlenbach-Zürich’ [Questionnaire for Children’s Admission to the Institution ‘Martinstiftung’ in Erlenbach-Zurich], file V ZH 24,421, Swiss National Library.
68 This notion becomes evident in the teachers’ descriptions of children attending special institutions or children designated to attend special classes (see below).
69 Previously, all children had been gathered together and had been taught individually or by mutual instruction. See Carlo Jenzer, Die Schulklasse: Eine historisch-systematische Untersuchung [The School Class: A Historico-Systematic Analysis] (Bern: Lang, 1991), 351, 362.
70 Martine Ruchat, ‘“Widerspenstige”, “Undisziplinierte” und “Zurückgebliebene”: Kinder, die von der Schulnorm abweichen (1874–1890)’ [‘Unruly’, ‘Ill-Disciplined’ and ‘Retarded’: Children Who Deviate from School Norm (1874–1890)], in Eine Schule für die Demokratie: Zur Entwicklung der Volksschule in der Schweiz im 19. Jahrhundert, ed. Lucien Criblez et al. (Bern: Lang, 1999), 274. The boom in child psychology and child study in the last decades of the nineteenth century is also important in this regard. Influenced by the concept of evolution, development became a ‘magic word’. Child psychology and child study were interested in asking how children develop from birth to the end of adolescence. Both disciplines wanted to apply the methods of modern, empirical science to discover the laws of ‘normal’ child development and to improve education. See Burkhard Fuhs, ‘Das Kind als Objekt der Wissenschaft’ [The Child as a Scientific Object], in Kindsein kein Kinderspiel: Das Jahrhundert des Kindes (1900–1999)], ed. Petra Larass (Halle: Verlag der Franckeschen Stiftungen, 2000), 373–89; Peter Rossmann, Einführung in die Entwicklungspsychologie des Kindes- und Jugendalters [Introduction to Developmental Psychology of Childhood and Adolescence] (Bern: Huber, 2012), 15–17; Lucien Criblez, ‘Die experimentelle “Avantgarde” der Pädagogik in der Schweiz zu Beginn des 20. Jahrhunderts’ [The Experimental ‘Avant-Garde’ of Pedagogy in Switzerland at the Beginning of the 20th Century], Jahrbuch für Historische Bildungsforschung 19 (2013): 13–34; Edgar Weiss, ‘Entwicklung’ [Development], in Handbuch der Reformpädagogik in Deutschland (1890–1933), ed. Wolfgang Keim and Ulrich Schwerdt, vol. 1 (Frankfurt a. M.: Lang, 2013), 363–78.
71 See, e.g., Anstalt zur Hoffnung Basel, ‘Notizen zu einzelnen Zöglingen, 1857–1894’ [Notes about Individual Pupils, 1857–1894], file PA 444 6, State archives Basel-City; Anstalt zur Hoffnung Basel, ‘Aufzeichnungen über die Zöglinge, 1857–ca. 1890‘ [Notes about Pupils, 1857–ca. 1890], ‘Klientendossiers (1857–1985)’ [Clients Dossiers (1857–1985)], file ED-REG 41a 1–1 (1), State archives Basel-City; Spezialklassen Basel, ‘Specialklasse für schwachbegabte Kinder 1887–1892’ [Special Class for Moronic Children 1887–1892], file Erziehungsacten K 13, State archives Basel-City; Jahresberichte der Anstalt für schwachsinnige Kinder in Regensberg [Annual Reports of the Institution for Imbecile Children in Regensberg] (Zürich: Herzog/Leemann, 1883–1913).
72 Spezialklassen Basel, ‘Specialklasse für schwachbegabte Kinder 1887–1892: Brief [1889]’ [Special Class for Moronic Children 1887–1892: Letter [1889]], file Erziehungsacten K 13, State archives Basel-City.
73 Anstalt zur Hoffnung Basel, ‘Notizen zu einzelnen Zöglingen, 1857–1894’ [Notes about Individual Pupils, 1857–1894], file PA 444 6, State archives Basel-City.
74 See Theodore M. Porter, The Rise of Statistical Thinking, 1820–1900 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986). Scientists from different disciplines wanted to decipher the fundamental principles of social life by means of statistics. ‘Statistics could provide an understanding not only of the prevailing causes of death and disease but also of crime and revolution, respectively the chronic and epidemic disorders of the human spirit’ (ibid., 31). The ‘law of large numbers’ should provide a scientific basis for socio-political reforms. Accordingly, extensive statistical studies on different areas of social life were conducted beginning in the second half of the nineteenth century. See, e.g., Jakob Tanner, Fabrikmahlzeit: Ernährungswissenschaft, Industriearbeit und Volksernährung in der Schweiz 1890–1950 [Factory Meal: Nutritional Science, Industrial Labour and Public Nourishment in Switzerland 1890–1950] (Zürich: Chronos, 1999), 127–34.
75 In November 1897, the Swiss Federal Statistical Office published a report that provided a comprehensive overview of the nationwide survey’s results. See Die Zählung der schwachsinnigen Kinder im schulpflichtigen Alter [Survey of Imbecile Children of School Age], vol. 1 (Bern: Schmid & Francke, 1897). Extensive reports on the survey results were also published in different educational journals. See, e.g., ‘Die Zählung der schwachsinnigen Kinder im schulpflichtigen Alter’ [Survey of Imbecile Children of School Age], Jahrbuch des Unterrichtswesens in der Schweiz 9/10 (1898): 1–115. As expected by its initiators, the survey supported the hypothesis that a great number of children suffered from ‘idiocy’ and that only a few of them were educated in special classes or special institutions.
76 The results were regularly published in the Zeitschrift für Schweizerische Statistik [Journal for Swiss Statistics].
77 See Anleitungen für das Lehrpersonal. Versions of this instruction for the French- and Italian-speaking parts of Switzerland also existed.
78 Parental observations, written down in observational diaries, had become popular in the late eighteenth century. See Pia Schmid, ‘Die bürgerliche Kindheit’ [The Bourgeois Childhood], in Kindheiten in der Moderne: Eine Geschichte der Sorge, ed. Meike Sophia Baader, Florian Eßer and Wolfgang Schröer (Frankfurt am Main: Campus Verlag, 2014), 66–8.
79 See [Karl Kölle], ‘Prüfung auf Schwachsinnigkeit’ [Examination of Idiocy], Anleitungen für das Lehrpersonal, um die in das Alter der Schulpflicht getretenen Kinder auf das Vorhandensein geistiger oder körperlicher Gebrechen zu untersuchen ([Bern]: [Neukomm & Zimmermann], [1899]), 1–4.
80 Anleitungen für das Lehrpersonal, 16.
81 See [Kölle], Prüfung auf Schwachsinnigkeit, 2–3. Among these aspects were shortness, a sluggish gait, an irregular head form, an expressionless face, a flat nose, defective teeth and a thick neck.
82 See ibid., 3–4.
83 For the second survey, almost 7000 instruction leaflets were distributed among the schools in 1899 alone. See Die Zählung der schwachsinnigen Kinder im schulpflichtigen Alter [Survey of Imbecile Children of School Age], vol. 2 (Bern: Schmid & Francke, 1900), 60–1.
84 See James C. Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998), 339–40.
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Michèle Hofmann
Michèle Hofmann is a senior research fellow and lecturer at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Northwestern Switzerland, School of Education. She holds a master’s degree in history and a PhD in the history of education from the University of Bern. She has been a guest lecturer at the University of Vienna, the Humboldt University of Berlin and at the University of Education in Ludwigsburg as well as a visiting scholar at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education. Her academic interests include the medicalisation of education, the history of (special) education in Switzerland, and historical research methodology.