Crafting Immunity

Kenton Kroker is Assistant Professor in the Division of Natural Science, Faculty of Science and Engineering at the York University, Toronto, Canada. Jennifer Keelan is Assistant Professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences, University of Toronto, Canada. Pauline M.H. Mazumdar is Professor Emeritus, IHPST, University of Toronto, Canada.

• Contents: Editors' introduction; Part I Reason and Risk: Making sense of vaccination c.1800, Andrea Rusnock; Risk, efficacy and viral attenuation in debates over smallpox vaccination in Montreal, 1870-1877, Jennifer Keelan. Part II The Conundrum of Allergy: 'A private line to medicine': the clinical and laboratory contours of allergy in the early 20th century, Mark Jackson; Germs, vaccine and the rise of allergy, Carla C. Keirns. Part III Some Tools of the Trade: Neutralising flu: 'immunological devices' and the making of a virus disease, Michael Bresalier; Ceatures of reason? Picturing viruses at the Pasteur Institute during the 1920s, Kenton Kroker; Immunology in the clinics: reductionism, holism or both?, Ilana Löwy; Antitoxin and anatoxine: the League of Nations and the Institut Pasteur, 1920-1939, Pauline M.H. Mazumdar. Part IV Insiders, Immunity and Identity after World War II: Molecular surveillance: a history of radioimmunoassays, Angela N.H. Creager; Emerging paradigm, emerging disease: molecular immunology and AIDS in the 1980s, Victoria A. Harden; Conceptualising the maternal-fetal relationship in reproductive immunology, Moira Howes; Canadian vaccine research, production and international regulation: Connaught Laboratories and smallpox vaccines, 1962-1980, Christopher J. Rutty; Index.

’All in all, the book is a very welcome addition to the historiography of immunology. With well edited papers, illustrations and an index, it is also very useable. It reminds us that in studying the history of medicine it is often rewarding to focus on what people do rather than what they write.’ Medical History