Moral Treatment of the Insane: Provisions for Lifelong Learning, Cultural Engagement, and Creativity in Nineteenth-Century Asylums

Abstract

The current interest in the role of lifelong learning and cultural engagement for change is not new. This article looks at a most unusual precedent and a neglected area in the historiography of adult education – the use of cultural education provision in asylums in the nineteenth century to promote cure and restoration of the ‘insane’ to society. Focusing on the example of Crichton Royal Institution in Scotland, but with reference to other asylums, the many activities offered to patients – formal adult education classes, access to asylum libraries and museums, publication of asylum periodicals, musical and theatrical entertainments, drawing and painting, and attendance at cultural events beyond the asylum walls – are discussed. The article examines the reasons for their introduction, assesses the impact that such activity had on the lives of this most marginalized of social groups, and argues that they can be seen as an early and innovative example of lifelong learning in practice.