The Science of Walking recounts the story of the growing interest and
investment of Western scholars, physicians, and writers in the
scientific study of an activity that seems utterly trivial in its
everyday performance yet essential to our human nature: walking. Most
people see walking as a natural and unremarkable activity of daily life,
yet the mechanism has long puzzled scientists and doctors, who
considered it an elusive, recalcitrant, and even mysterious act. In The
Science of Walking, Andreas Mayer provides a history of investigations
of the human gait that emerged at the intersection of a variety of
disciplines, including physiology, neurology, orthopedic surgery,
anthropology, and psychiatry.
Looking back at more than a century of locomotion research, Mayer
charts, for the first time, the rise of scientific endeavors to control
and codify locomotion and analyzes their social, political, and
aesthetic ramifications throughout the long nineteenth century. In an
engaging narrative that weaves together science and history, Mayer sets
the work of the most important representatives of the physiology of
locomotion--including Wilhelm and Eduard Weber and Étienne-Jules
Marey--in their proper medical, political, and artistic contexts. In
tracing the effects of locomotion studies across other cultural domains,
Mayer reframes the history of the science of walking and gives us a
deeper understanding of human movement.
