Preliminary Programme

My presentation will be devoted to an archival case from Russian State Military-Historical Archive. In 1760 a Ukrainian priest Andrei Babich petitioned to Arsenii, metropolitan of Kiev, that his father, a warrant officer (praporshchsik), reveiled to him the secret of producing steel bullets able to break through the cuirasses. After his father’s death Andrei Babich performed a series of tests that proved his father’s words. Moreover, Andrei invented his own way of producing lead bullets that were also able to break through the cuirasses. The substances that Babich proposed to add to steel and lead were bears fat, mercury, milk of white coat, bluestone, hot sulfur, wax, alum. Since one of his neighbors accused Andrei Babich of witchcraft, the last asked military authorities to check his inventions and use them if appropriate. As a result two series of tests were performed. Both proved that bullets, produced according to the receipts by Babich were able to break through the cuirasses. But the officers of the Gun’s Office noted that ordinary bullets are also able to break through the cuirasses, although steel bullets do it better. They asked the permission to perform some extra-tests. But in 1762 the Master-General of the Ordnance Alexander Vilboa rejected to do so claiming that steel bullets “are not used in battles and the gun can be harmed by the steel bullet”. In my paper I am going to explore the interrelations of magical and (pre)scientific consciousness of the Ukrainian priest and Russian officers that this case reveals. (Show less)

In the course of the twentieth century, German human genetics experienced considerable changes in content and shifts. After the Second World War, the subject was confronted with the heritage of eugenics and had to reform itself institutionally after the dissolution of racial hygiene facilities and institutes (Krischel, Halling, Fangerau 2012).
After a first thrust through chromosome analysis in the late 1950s (Vogel 1999; Tomaschke 2014), several phenotypically diagnosable "syndromes" (Down, Klinefelter, Turner) could be attributed to chromosomal causes, which decisively contributed to the medical orientation of human genetics (McKusnick 1975).
Since 1969, genetic counselling centres have been established throughout the Federal Republic; in 1972, a genetic polyclinic was founded in Marburg (Vogel 1999).
In Germany, the focus of the discussions shifted away from an eccentric population towards an individualized medical discipline. Since 1975, genetic counselling and diagnostics has been part of the performance catalogue of the statutory health insurance (Pfadenhauer 2003).
The research project investigates technical and conceptual delays, for example, the development of biochemical population genetics (from the 1960s) and cytogenetics (from the 1970s) as well as gene mapping and sequencing projects (Tomaschke 2014). One focus is, among other things, on social ethical implications and their framework of human behaviour: societal relevance and debates about medical genetics (diagnosis, methods and technologies, genetic counselling, development of attestations of paternity) and their macroethics implications
The project can be based on numerous studies on the history of German human genetics (Vgl. Kröner 1997, 1998; Cottebrune 2006, 2008; Weingart 1988; Bennike 1992). The continuities and breaks of post-war human genetics on eugenics are also taken into account (Weingart, Kroll, Bayertz 1992; Kühl 2014) and the development of German human genetics is described in an international context (McKusnick 1975; Harper 2008; Motulsky 2010).
The presented project analyses the development of medical genetics and the establishment of its institutions in German-speaking countries. It is designed as an oral history project including 15 – 25 actors of medical genetics from Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
The survey is based on methods of oral history (Obertreis 2012; Ritchie 2014). 25 theme-focussed, semi-structured expert interviews will provide the source material. This is supplemented by (auto-) biographical literature of protagonists of German-speaking medical genetics. Interview partners will represent German language medical genetics in its full range, i.e. include (traditionally) underrepresented groups.
The interviews will be evaluated by qualitative content analysis according to Mayring (2003) and will be used to challenge the historiography. Members of the project team are: Prof. Heiner Fangerau, Dr. Felicitas Söhner, Dr. Matthis Krischel (all Institute of History and Ethics of Medicine, University Dusseldorf). The project is financed for two years by the German Society of Human Genetics (GFH), proposals for further funding are planned. (Show less)