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AIDS). Consider this discussion among patients suffering from chronic fatigue syndrome. "Many patients feel that one of the greatest burdens of having chronic fatigue syndrome is the name of the illness. The word fatigue (which many patients refer to as the 'F' word) indicates everyday tiredness. It reinforces negative perceptions that remain with the public and most medical doctors, despite a decade of steady, gradual research advances" (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Electronic Newsletter, 20 February 1997). One option was to name it after Darwin, but it was felt that although he had the scientific cachet, he didn't necessarily have the disease. Inversely, Florence Nightingale's diagnosis is somewhat more certain but less prestigious: |
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Nightingale's. (A general note: no historical figure has been definitively diagnosed with CFS/M.E. Purists may object to choosing any person in history, who may not have actually had the disease, as the basis for an eponym.) Florence Nightingale is a widely respected and world-renowned figure who founded the International Red Cross and the first formal school for nursing. For decades she had an undiagnosed, severely debilitating illness, whose symptoms were similar to CFS. Despite Nightingale's considerable talents and her personal character, many doubted that she had a physical illness. Her illness was quite controversial. A 1996 paper by D.A.B. Young which appeared in the British Medical Journal indicates that Nightingale's illness was likely to have been chronic brucellosis (a disease with symptoms similar but not identical to CFS). Patient groups have promoted Nightingale's birthday, May 12, as International CFIDS/M.E. Awareness Day, and Nightingale is a familiar symbol to those who know this disease. However, some argue that women's diseases often have difficulty in getting recognized and accepted. Choosing Nightingale's name as an eponym might add to, rather than offer relief from, current name-associated problems. (Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Electronic Newsletter, 20 February 1997) |
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More generally, Taylor from a linguistic perspective and Durkheim and Maussfor whom primitive, social classifications, "seem to link, without any discontinuity, with the first scientific classifications" (Durkheim and Mauss 1969, 82)from an anthropological one have observed that technical classifications grow out of and have to answer to our common sense, socially comfortable classifications. It just would not be socially feasible to call a donkey a fish, no matter how good your scientific grounds. |
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There is no great divide between folk and scientific classifications. Below, we discuss one particular fault line between the two: a fracture that is constantly being redefined and changing its nature as the plate of lived experience is subducted under the crust of scientific |
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