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In their October 6, 2024, issue, The Shanghai Review of Books published a feature interview with faculty member Todd Meyers about the Chinese translation of his book, The Clinic and Elsewhere. Link:

Photo of  Todd Meyers


Phoebe Friesen and colleagues have been awarded a Discovery Award from the Wellcome Trust. Under the leadership of Emilie Cloatre, they will explore how unproven, disproven, or misleading health-related claims are regulated in contemporary states; examine the socio-political implications of current strategies; and imagine and propose alternative legal models. For more, see


SSoM departmental postdoctoral researcher, Dr. Hugo Rueda Ramíez, has joined an advisory group of international scholars working with the (formerly known as Museum Volkenkunde), invited to address the legacies of ethnographic museums today.


Listen to Annmarie Adams in The 鶹 Journal of Medicine (MJM) Podcast Series, MJM MedTalks


Annmarie Adams published a paper about her own biographical relationship with her research subject, Maude Abbott, in “Maude & Me.” Women and Architectural History: The Monstrous Regiment Then and Now. Edited by Dana Arnold. London: Routledge, 42-58.


Faculty member Todd Meyers talks about the grief crisis hidden in the opioid crisis in a recent Op-Ed in La Presse (July 30, 2024), "La crise des surdose cache une crise de deuils".


Thomas Schlich provided historical background for an article published in the MIT Technology Review on AI in the operating room.

hospital scene for MIT article on AI and surgery


Annmarie Adams published “Shift Work: The Hospital in Histories of Architecture and Medicine,” Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians (2024) 83 (2): 134–147.


Faculty member and acting department chair Todd Meyers has joined the journal Sciences Sociales et Santé as a scientific correspondent.

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Annmarie Adams published a chapter on Montreal’s Scottish architects “’Glad of your help’: Scottish Architects in Montreal, 1860-1940,” Montreal's Square Mile: The Making and Transformation of a Colonial Metropole, eds Dimitry Anastakis, Elizabeth Kirkland, Don Nerbas. University of Toronto Press, 279-311.

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Thomas Schlich discussed his book project “A History of Modern Surgery” at the Research Colloquium of the Institute for the History and Ethics in Medicine of the Charité in Berlin, Germany on May 21, 2024.


On May 21, 2024, Thomas Schlich commented on a paper by Isabela Dornelas entitled “Follow the Thread: Entangled Human Tissues and Animal Fibres” at the Max-Planck-Institute for the History of Science in Berlin Germany.


Faculty member Phoebe Friesen's article "A Dangerous Diagnosis: How "Excited Delirium" Shapes Police Perception" appeared in the May 21, 2024 issue of The Conversation.

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Annmarie Adams curated the exhibition “Reading Abbott,” for the Osler Library, on through November 2024.

Photo of Osler library entrance with poster Reading Abbott Poster


The 2024 edition of the has been published with special mention of SSoM's longstanding contributions to health humanities teaching and research!

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Faculty member Phoebe Friesen gave a keynote address at the Annual Meeting of the Association for the Advancement of Philosophy of Psychiatry, May 6, 2024, in New York City.

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Annmarie Adams published the following two book reviews:

“The Architecture and Landscape of Health: A Historical Perspective on Therapeutic Places 1790–1940,” by Julie Collins, London, Routledge, 2020, Fabrications, 1–3.

“When Eero Met His Match,” by Eva Hagberg, Panorama: Journal of the Associations of Historians of American Art,

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Thomas Schlich gave the Keynote Lecture for the workshop “Contextualizing Transplantation: Medicine, Society, and Culture”, at Nanyang Technological University, in Singapore, on April 16, 2024.

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On April 11, 2024, at the SSoM book launch Dr Abraham Fuks discussed Janina Wellmann's new book, "Biological Motion A History of Life" (Princeton University University Press).


Thomas Schlich spoke about the introduction of elective surgery as a new concept in modern medicine and a decisive step in the history of surgery. The presentation was part of the “Swiss Seminar in the History of Medicine” which in 2023/24 is devoted to the theme “Therapeutic Approaches”. It took place at the “Chair for Medical Humanities” in Fribourg, Switzerland, March 21, 2024. The title is “The Best Therapeutic Option? ‘Elective’ Interventions and the Rise of Modern Surgery (1860s-1920s).” 2024.


Sebestian Kroupa gave a talk “On Bezoars and Other Healing Stones in Manila: Making Medical Knowledge Across Indo-Pacific Worlds, c.1700” part of Indian Ocean World Centre seminar series on 20 March, 3-5pm in Rm 116, Peterson Hall.


On March 14, Thomas Schlich gave a talk about the role of statistics in the rise of modern surgery under the title “Safe Surgery: Counting and the Rise of Surgery, 18th-20th centuries”. The talk will be at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin for the seminar series “Research Therapy” of the Workgroup “Practices of Validation”.


On March 7, 2024, Sahar Sadjadi, gave a lecture "Reseach on Sensitive Topics: The Case of an Ethnographic Study of Children and Gender Clinics in the US," at the University of Ottawa at the Laboratory for Engaged Research.


Annmarie Adams presented “Race and the Medical Museum: The Case of Maude Abbott,” at the College Art Association annual conference on 14 February 2024 in Chicago. .


Thomas Schlich gave a talk on February 19 entitled ’Against Human Vivisection’ – Criticism of Surgery in Britain, the US, and Germany, 1880s-1914, part of the webinar series of The Groningen Centre for Health and Humanities and the Centre for Historical Studies.All seminars are 16:00-17:00 Dutch time. Online sessions are hosted on Google Meet. Please send an e-mail to James Kennaway (James.kennaway [at] rug.nl) to receive the link. More info here:


New article byJonah Campbell, Alberto Cambrosio, Mark Basik, “Histology Agnosticism: Infra-Molecularizing Disease?” in press in Studies in History and Philosophy of Science (2024).


New paper by Anna K. Swartz and Phoebe Friesen: "The First Smart Pill: Digital Revolution or Last Gasp?" published in the Kennedy Institute of Ethics journal:


East China Normal University Press has announced the Chinese translation of SSoM Professor Todd Meyers's book, The Clinic and Elsewhere: Addiction, Adolescents, and the Afterlife of Therapy (U Washington Press, 2013) forthcoming later this year.

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SSoM Professor and Acting Chair Todd Meyers discussed his recent book, All That Was Not Her, at the UCLA Institute for Society and Genetics on January 25.


New publication in Philosophy, Psychiatry, and Psychology by Arjun Byu and Phoebe Friesen on a controversial diagnosis - Making up monsters, redirecting blame: An examination of excited delirium. Link:


Annmarie Adams reviewed two new books on COVID and architecture for the Journal of Design History

Booker Cover Architecture after COVID Book Cover Architectue in the Era of Covid-19


Annmarie Adams is one of three co-editors for an upcoming special issue of the Canadian Journal of Health History on mothering, medicine, and health. Abstracts due 31 January. CFP:


Annmarie Adams is Chair of this year’s committee to name the Alice Davis Hitchcock Book Award. This annual prize is given by the Society of Architectural Historians to recognize the most distinguished work of scholarship in the history of architecture published by a North American scholar. Link:


New article in Aeon by Phoebe Friesen explores whether psychedelics can teach us something about psychosis? See here:


On the evening of January 11, 2024, at a book launch hosted by 鶹's Maude Abbott Medical Museum, SSoM professor Annmarie Adams, along with Alexandre Klein (U Ottawa), discussed Martin Robert's new book, "Cette science nécessaire: Dissections humaines et formation médicale au Québec" (鶹-Queen's University Press). Photos: Peter Gossage


In fall 2023, Sahar Sadjadi delivered a keynote lecture, "Doing Justice: The Study of Life and Practice of Science," at Carleton University. This lecture was organized by the Faculty of Science to honour the legacy of Henrietta Lacks.


Congratulations to Alberto Cambrosio who was elected as one of the Royal Society of Canada’s New fellow to the Academy of Artsand Humanities. royal-society-of-canada/


On November 1, 2023, from 6 to 7 p.m. at the Redpath Museum Amphitheatre, Gordon Guyatt, MD, پپԲܾ Professor in the Departments of Medicine and Health Research Methods, Evidence & Impact at McMaster University, delivered the 2023 Osler Lectureship, “How evidence-based medicine has – and has not – changed the world.” Ahead of his visit, Todd Meyers, PhD, from the Department of Social Studies of Medicine, spoke with Dr. Guyatt about his pioneering work in evidence-based medicine.

Gordon Guyatt Photo






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