著者

寺尾 範野 Hanno Terao

雑誌

共立国際研究 : 共立女子大学国際学部紀要 = The Kyoritsu journal of international studies

巻号頁・発行日

vol.35, pp.89-105, 2018-03

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This paper attempts to clarify in what ways eugenicist thinkers in late 19th and early 20th century Britain justified the segregation of people with mild intellectual disability (then called the "feeble-minded") into specialized institutions. For this purpose, the discourse of main eugenicist thinkers at that time, such as Karl Pearson, Alfred Tredgold, Sidney Webb, and Mary Dendy, is explored. It is found that, in addition to using "hard" discourse, which emphasized the threat of the feeble-minded to British society and insisted on prohibiting their marriage and reproduction, they also often used "soft" discourse, which justified segregated institutions as ideal places for providing the feeble-minded with humanitarian care and for realizing their happiness. The paper concludes that such "soft" discourse could be even more influential than "hard" discourse at the time the Mental Deficiency Act was enacted in 1913.