Rewriting the Soul

Hacking uses the recent multiple personality disorder (MPD) epidemic and its links with the contemporary concept of child abuse to scrutinize today's moral and political climate, esp. our power struggles about memory and our efforts to cope with psychological injuries. Explores a fascinating series of historical vignettes about an earlier wave of multiples, people who were diagnosed as new ways of thinking about memory emerged, esp. in late 19th-cent. France. Scientists then made memory a surrogate for the soul and then subjected it to empirical investigation. Concludes with a powerful analysis linking historical and contemporary material in a fresh contribution to the archaeology of knowledge.