From some of my previous research into the social contexts surrounding Jane Eyre, I looked at a source that mentioned how Jane’s reaction to Bertha is odd considering the changing opinions of mental illness to be in a more positive light. In looking through the digital archive, I was looking for an artifact that might illustrate this change and I came across the document featured below. This artifact, titled “Remarks on Nervous & Mental Disorder, with especial reference to recent investigations on the subject of insanity,” is a pamphlet written by David Uwins in 1830 about mental illness and the public’s perceptions of the mentally ill. Uwins explicitly states his motives for writing about this topic: first, that mental illness has been considered too far removed from physical illnesses; second, those skilled in medicine should be diagnosing mental illness instead of regular people; and third, that the fearful image surrounding asylums is uncalled for and these places should be viewed just as you would a house of recovery for a physical illness or disease. This is important because it signifies the beginning of the shift in attitude towards the mentally ill. This was a huge step towards recognizing that people with mental illness are still people and that they don’t deserve to be locked away in an asylum (or the attic at Thornfield as in Jane Eyre) where the general public wouldn’t have to interact with them. This pamphlet also argues for a more proper use of terminology surrounding mental illness, specifically in regards to a person’s “soundness of mind.” Uwins points out that there is no basis in using this terminology to describe someone who is mentally ill, and that there are better ways of determining if such a person needs help, like determining if they are capable of making good decisions for themselves. This puts society in a position where it is no longer placing judgment on a person suffering from mental illness, but rather it is recognizing that the person needs to be cared for just as someone with tuberculosis or smallpox would need to be cared for.
