Using Human Specimens in the Study of Tuberculosis

This chapter examines the processes in which dying subjects are turned into research objects in the study of tuberculosis. Starting with Robert Koch's microbial studies and ending with the examination of the use of wet tissue specimens this chapter advocates for theoretical and ethical frameworks that centralize the continuity between dying patient and the research objects produced from their bodies.

Section: 1: Seeing Disease in Methyl Violet

This section examines Robert Koch's bacteriological research into tuberculosis. This case study frames an approach to medical media studies, and an emphasis on the human specimen.

2.1.1 | 2.1.2 | 2.1.3 | 2.1.4

Section: 2: Case Histories

This section looks to the medical histories which commonly accompany wet tissue specimens in tuberculosis research.

2.2.1 | 2.2.2 | 2.2.3 | 2.2.4

Section: 3: Visceral Processes

This section uses the work of George E. Bushnell, a US Army doctor during the first world war, to consider the extractive framing practices necessary to produce wet tissue specimens.

2.3.1 | 2.3.2

Section: 4: Relation

Concluding the chapter, this section critiques new materialist approaches to relation, as a mean to think through the ethical problems of using human tissues in medical research, as well as the history of medicine.

2.4.1 | 2.4.2 | 2.4.3