Fictions of the Scientific Imagination: Researching the Dionne Quintuplets

This paper explores stories told by a group of scientists about the Dionne Quintuplets. A team of researchers, nurses and teachers under the leadership of Toronto child psychologist William E. Blatz took charge of the education and child-rearing of the famous children in March 1935. They constructed...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of Canadian studies 1995-01, Vol.29 (4), p.86-110
Main Author: Dehli, Kari
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:This paper explores stories told by a group of scientists about the Dionne Quintuplets. A team of researchers, nurses and teachers under the leadership of Toronto child psychologist William E. Blatz took charge of the education and child-rearing of the famous children in March 1935. They constructed an environment where, they hoped, the five girls would develop into autonomous, healthy and happy individuals. Paradoxically, constant surveillance and complete regulation of interaction with "outsiders” — including the Quintuplets’ biological parents and siblings — structured daily life in the Dionne nursery. The paper shows how researchers constructed the conditions which made it possible to read the Quintuplets as at once unique and ordinary, as coherent, rational and self-regulating individuals. I argue that these fictions of scientific imagination occluded both the labour of women and the social relations of power through which they were produced.
ISSN:0021-9495
1911-0251
DOI:10.3138/jcs.29.4.86