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| title | chunk | source | category | tags | date_saved | instance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Female hysteria | 3/4 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_hysteria | reference | science, encyclopedia | 2026-05-05T09:19:50.306581+00:00 | kb-cron |
== 20th century == In the 1910s, psychiatrist L. E. Emerson was heavily involved in treating patients of hysteria at the Boston Psychopathic Hospital. Emerson published case studies on his patients, who were often "young, single, native-born, and white" and either had been raped or had a lack of healthy sexual relationships. One of his more famous works was a case study of a woman called "Miss A". In the study, Emerson summarized the patient's experience with sexual violence, which he said that most women with hysteria had encountered. Miss A practiced self-harm, which Emerson deduced to be a release for the sexual assault she had previously experienced and a substitute for masturbation. Another case study was of Sally Hollis, a woman who often viewed her experience with sexual assault in terms of her own failures and female aggression. Believing the roots of hysteria lay in sexual conflict, Emerson noted the theme of lack of sexual knowledge amongst these women, viewing them as repressed. Their sexual ignorance ranged from lack of knowledge about menstruation to conception to the process of giving birth. Some women purposefully sought out the "hysteric" diagnosis because they believed it could provide an answer to what they were experiencing. Most of the patients that Emerson saw were single because they were either young or had purposefully avoided men. Author Elizabeth Lunbeck wrote that these women typically fell into three categories. They either withdrew from the heterosexual sphere entirely despite wanting to participate; they experienced something that was sexually unwanted but would experience guilt over what happened like Sally Hollis; or they were haunted by their sexual traumas in the past. As hysteria was becoming a more prominent diagnosis amongst women, police began treating any report for sexual assault or rape with skepticism, with the common belief at the time being that "sexual assault is physically impossible without consent".
== Freud and decline of diagnosis ==
During the early 20th century, the number of women diagnosed with female hysteria sharply declined. Some medical authors claim that the decline was due to gaining a greater understanding of the psychology behind conversion disorders such as hysteria. The understanding of the field of psychiatry was becoming more nuanced at the time, with Sigmund Freud's introduction of the theory of psychoanalysis and his other ideas surrounding women and their sexuality. With so many possible symptoms, historically hysteria was considered a catch-all diagnosis that any unidentifiable ailment could be assigned. As diagnostic techniques improved, the number of ambiguous cases that might have been attributed to hysteria declined. For instance, before the introduction of electroencephalography, epilepsy was frequently confused with hysteria. Sigmund Freud claimed that hysteria was not physical at all but rather an internal emotional condition brought on by trauma that could affect both men and women and prevented them from enjoying sex in the normal way. This would later lead to Freud's development of the Oedipus complex, which connotes femininity as a failure, or lack of masculinity. Although some earlier studies had posited that men were also prone to hysteria, over time, the condition was related mainly to issues of femininity as the continued study of hysteria took place only in women. Many cases that had previously been labeled hysteria were reclassified by Freud as anxiety neuroses. It was Freud's theory that hysteria may have been related to the unconscious mind and separate from the conscious mind or the ego. He was convinced that deep conflicts in the mind, some concerning instinctual drives for sex and aggression, were driving the behavior of those with hysteria. The illness of hysteria is an "expression of the impossibility of the fulfillment of the sexual drive because of reminiscence of the Oedipal conflict". This hypothesis is a driving force behind the psychological theory of psychoanalysis, as a way to help patients that had been diagnosed with hysteria reduce internal conflicts causing physical and emotional suffering. New theories relating to hysteria came from speculation; doctors and physicians could not connect symptoms to the disorder, causing it to decline rapidly as a diagnosis. Hysteria was officially removed from the DSM in 1980. Today, female hysteria is no longer a recognized illness, but different manifestations of hysteria are recognized in other conditions such as schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, functional neurological symptom disorder, and anxiety attacks.
== Relationship with women's rights and feminism == In the 1980s, feminists began to reclaim the term "hysteria", using it as a symbol of the systematic oppression of women and reclaiming the term for themselves. The idea of hysteria became an embodiment of the oppressions against women, especially among sex-positive feminists, who believed sexual repression being considered hysteria was a form of oppression. The idea stemmed from the belief that hysteria was a kind of pre-feminist rebellion against the oppressive defined social roles placed upon women. Feminist writers such as Catherine Clément and Hélène Cixous wrote in The Newly Born Woman from a place of opposition to the theories proposed in psychoanalytical works. Clément, Cixous and other feminist writers pushed back against the notion that socially constructed femininities and hysteria are natural to being female. Feminist social historians of both sexes argue that hysteria is caused by women's oppressed social roles, rather than by their bodies or psyches.
== Representation in creative works ==
=== Charlotte Perkins Gilman ===
"The Yellow Wallpaper" is a short story by Charlotte Perkins Gilman that demonstrates the mistreatment of hysteria and illuminates the deep-rooted misogynistic systems that existed at the time. Published in 1892, this piece is an early example of media in which medical care is interrogated through a feminist lens. In the story, the female protagonist is confined to an upstairs room at the instruction of her husband, who is a physician, which paradoxically worsens her condition. Over the course of her lengthy confinement, the protagonist becomes obsessed with the yellow wallpaper and believes she can see a woman inside it as her mental state deteriorates.
=== Safe ===