Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- Care of the Mentally Ill -- Asylum Attendants and Mental Nurses -- The Historiography of Mental Health Nursing -- Four Asylums as Case Studies -- The Chapters in Brief -- Chapter I Asylum Reform Ideals: Personnel Matters -- The Appeal of Institutional Care and Moral Treatment -- A Legal Basis for Asylum Reform -- Increased Medical Influence -- Liberal Views, Reform Rhetoric, and the Problem of Personnel -- Lower-Class Institutions -- The Position of Attendants and Patients in the Asylum Hierarchy -- Different Responses and Different Solutions: Roman Catholic Initiatives -- Reform Ideals Frustrated: Asylum Growth and a New Law -- A Second Law on the Insane -- Awakening of Protestant Duty -- Conclusion -- Chapter II The Ideal of a Mental Hospital -- New Medical Opinions: Scientific Psychiatry -- Medical Views in Veldwijk: A Christian Psychiatry -- Bed Rest -- Architectural Changes and the Increased Application of Bed Rest -- Hydrotherapy and Bath Treatment -- Work Remained -- The Inspiring Example of the General Hospital: A New Demand for Skilled Nursing -- Conclusion -- Chapter III Female Compassion: Mental Nurse Training Gendered Female -- Religious Roots -- Female Compassion, Domestic Ideology and the Women's Movement -- Growing Demand -- A New Educational Structure for Nurses -- A Respectable Salaried Occupation -- Female Influence -- Hospital Hierarchy -- Raising the Status of Psychiatry: The Introduction of Mental Nurse Training -- Gendered Ideals: Raising the Morality of Asylum Personnel -- Het Wilhelminahuis (The Wilhelmina Home) -- Conclusions -- Chapter IV The Burdensome Task of Nurses -- The Invisible Role of Nurses -- The Nurse as Object and Agent of a Disciplined Asylum Routine -- Threat, Repression, and Abuse: The Division of Wards as a Control Mechanism.

An Analysis of Patient Records -- Responding to Dependency -- Growing Old and Demented -- Sick since Youth -- Suffering from Mania, Acutely or Periodically -- The Care of Paralyzed and Handicapped Syphilis Patients -- They Wished to Be Dead: The Risk of Suicide -- Overcome by Delusions: The Risk of Refusing Food, Self-Mutilation, Violence and Escape -- Nervous Afflictions and Brain Trauma: Rare Cases in the Turn-of-the-Century Asylum -- Conclusion -- Chapter V Negotiating Class and Culture -- A Gendered Structure -- A New Discipline and Morale -- Culture Shock -- The Orthodox Protestant Perception of Mental Nurse Training: A Family Ideology -- Gendered Nursing Leadership in Veldwijk -- Implementing an Educational Structure -- Mental Nurse Training at Veldwijk -- Debate over The Boschhoek -- The Boschhoek Revisited -- Roman Catholic "Resistance" -- Conclusion -- Chapter VI The Marginalization of Male Nurses -- Nursing, a Respected Occupation - but not for Men -- Squeezed out -- Nurse Artisans -- The Home of a Married Nurse: A Place of Family Care? -- Growing Class Consciousness -- Male Nurse Activism and the Career of P.N. Bras -- Gendered Politics versus Expertise -- Conclusion -- Chapter VII Controversy and Conflict over the Social Position -- An Ambiguous Social Position -- Growing Social Awareness among Asylum Nursing Personnel -- Activism among the VCV Nurses -- Seeking Legal Protection from the State -- Controversy over Training -- Ambivalence over Morality and Class Background -- The Threat of Private Duty -- Tension over the NVP Exam Criteria -- Controversy over the Somatic Approach and Biomedical Footing of Psychiatric Care -- Conclusion -- Conclusion The Politics of Mental Health Nursing -- The Disappointment of Somatic Explanations in Turn-of-the-Century Psychiatry -- A Gendered Notion of Civilized Care.

The Educational versus the Social Value of Mental Nurse Training -- Economic Problems, Growing Costs -- Ideals and Limitations -- Appendix -- Notes -- List of Illustrations -- List of Abbreviations -- List of Archives -- Bibliography -- Index.