Page 73 - Humanism 2019

In the absence of physical etiology for these patients’ Some believed that exposing young ladies to the harsh
anorexia, Gull attributed the anorexic’s lack of appetite to realities of the outside world would risk tarnishing their
a morbid mental state. His inference was founded on his purity and worsen their prospects as future wives and
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observations that young women were prone to stubborn mothers.
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behavior. Although Gull found a correlation between the
psychological predispositions of young Victorian females The cultural drive to protect girls from stressors of the
and the psychic refusal of food by the anorexic patients, outside world was bolstered in light of anorexia nervosa
he was reluctant to call this disease “anorexia hysterica,” being more prevalent among young women who sought
as Dr. Charles Lasègue had done in his earlier published out college educations and career work. One physician
writings of l’anorexie hysterique. Gull wished to avoid argued that this correlation served as a “positive
that classification because the use of “hysterical” implied argument against higher education of women.” Freud and
female specificity. Although significantly more common in Beur noted that girls who got “out of bed at night so as
young women, Gull believed the title was inaccurate secretly to carry on some study that their parents have
because he had seen the same forbidden from fear of their
symptoms occasionally in boys. Food refusal symbolically overworking” went on to
Furthermore, the symptoms exhibit hysterical tendencies
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were only distantly similar to rejected gendered pressures later on in life.
the findings that Hippocrates and — as their bodies began to On an island where food was
described as hysteria: illogical more available and more in
and/or dramatic changes in shrink — enabled adolescent demand as English families
behavior related to girls to resemble the emaciated developed a sophisticated taste
menstruation, pregnancy, or for fine cuisine, food took on a
menopause; an antiquated look of the tubercular, which new meaning to the middle
umbrella term that describes was romanticized and idealized class. Mealtime was the center
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the class of women’s health of familial communication and
disorders that includes what we in some circles as an illness of bonding. Victorian mothers
now call PMDD, PMS, vulnerability and sensitivity. used food as a way to show
postpartum depression, and discipline as well as affection
symptoms of menopause, for their children. Mothers took
among others; however, Gull pride in their maternal duty of
believed that did not seem to be feeding and providing their
a good description of this children a healthful meal made
female-predominant disorder. with love. However, when
children misbehave, they often
Anorexic girls in the late 19th
century were overwhelmingly were sent to bed without
from upper- and middle-class dinner. After disrespecting their
families. By this time, English mother and the hard work she
culture had become so put into dinner, children would
modernized that it was common for wealthy families to be deprived of the meal they
raise children in schools, sheltered from the harsh farming took for granted. Consequently perhaps, teenage girls
and industrial working conditions experienced by children sensed the symbolic power of food in the family, how it
in the rest of the civilized world. This period of leisured regulated behavior, familial communication, and domestic
adolescence separated the upper- and middle-class from roles. By rejecting food at the dinner table, adolescent girls
the working class. While late 19th-century England was were rejecting their future in one of the few ways they
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knew how.
the soil of Jane Eyre, Dr. Mary Sharlieb, and the Queen,
most middle- and upper-class Victorian families Food refusal symbolically rejected gendered pressures and
encouraged their young ladies to pursue studies of — as their bodies began to shrink — enabled adolescent
etiquette and housewarming with the expectation of girls to resemble the emaciated look of the tubercular,
founding a bountiful family with a husband-provider. which was romanticized and idealized in some circles as
Victorian families cherished their young ladies and held an illness of vulnerability and sensitivity. This “wasting”
them responsible for maintaining the tenderness and disease influenced female fashion of the time — becoming
spirituality of the family. Some were sheltered from the thin was in style.
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public sphere to hold on to this innocence and virtue.

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