The Forced Migration of German-Speaking Neuroscientists, 1933-1989

The 20th century has been described as “The Age of Extremes,” witnessing two devastating world wars, which also led to a mass exodus of biological psychiatrists and neuroscientists from their home countries. Their plight and persecution are an eerie reminder today, when we witness the implications of the forced migration of academic refugees from Ukraine, Afghanistan, and Syria over the past decades.

In Great Minds in Despair Frank Stahnisch examines the long-term effects of the forced migration development which followed the rise of Nazism and Fascism in Central Europe since the 1930s. While many areas of academic refugees have now been well documented, such as the fields of the arts, humanities, physics, or chemistry, it is surprising that no comprehensive account exists so far concerning the forced migration in biological psychiatry and neuroscience. This is astonishing, especially when one ponders the great public awareness for the field since the “Decade of the Brain.”

As a historical expert, Stahnisch takes a broad perspective from the culture of Weimar neuroscience to the Cold War, while the second generation of German-speaking émigrés is also considered. Generational factors, gender, international networking, refugee organizations, and the role of national funding agencies are examined in rich case studies and collective biographies, including new perspectives on postwar remigration.

Frank W. Stahnisch is the Alberta Medical Foundation/Hannah Professor in the History of Medicine and Health Care at the University of Calgary. He is cross-appointed in the Department of Community Health Sciences in the Cumming School of Medicine and the Department of History in the Faculty of Arts. Previous books he authored include A New Field in Mind (2020), Medicine, Life and Function (2012), and Ideas in Action (2003).

Host or Publisher The Calgary Institute for the Humanities