Joseph M. Gabriel Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Biosketch
Joseph M. Gabriel is a historian of science, technology, and medicine. He also writes about bioethics and contemporary issues in medicine. Dr. Gabriel received his Ph.D. in 2006 from Rutgers University. Before coming to Florida State University he held a National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellowship in the Science Studies program at the University of California, San Diego. He has also taught at the University of Wisconsin, where he held the George Urdang Endowed Chair in the History of Pharmacy. He was the first person to hold an endowed chair in that field in the country and the first scholar in the humanities to achieve tenure at the College of Medicine. He is the recipient of the American Association for the History of Medicine’s Jack D. Pressman-Burroughs Wellcome Fund Award.
Dr. Gabriel has authored or co-authored more than 30 books, articles, book chapters, and legal briefs on the history of pharmaceuticals, clinical drug trials, academic medical science, and related topics. He is also interested in the history of public health, the history of addiction, legal history, narrative theory, and the history of ethics. He is the author of Medical Monopoly: Intellectual Property and the Origins of the Modern Pharmaceutical Industry (University of Chicago Press, 2014), co-author of Electronics: The Lifestory of a Technology (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007) and co-editor of Drugs on the Page: Pharmacopeias and Healing Knowledge in the Early Modern Atlantic World. His most recent book, co-edited with David Herzberg and Nils Kessel, is Risk/Benefit: History from the Border Between Licit and Illicit Drugs (University of Rochester Press, forthcoming).
Education
|
Rutgers University Ph.D., Department of History |
2006 |
|
University of Massachusetts at Amherst M.A., History |
1999 |
|
University of Massachusetts at Amherst B.A., Philosophy |
1992 |
Publications
- Matthew Crawford and Joseph M. Gabriel, eds. Drugs on the Page: Pharmacopeias and Healing Knowledge in the Early Modern Atlantic World (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019)
- Joseph M. Gabriel, Medical Monopoly: Intellectual Property Rights and the Origins of the Modern Pharmaceutical Industry (University of Chicago Press, 2014)
- Joseph M. Gabriel, “Ehrlich’s Dangerous Magic: Salvarsan, Innovation, and Narrative” in Kessel, N., Gabriel, J. and Herzberg, D., eds., Risk/Benefit: History from the Medicine and Drug Divide. Forthcoming.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Thick Concepts and Pharmaceutical Industry Corruption” in Joel Faintuch (Sao Paulo University) and Salomao Faintuch (Harvard Medical School), eds., Business Ethics in the Healthcare Industry. Springer. 2026
-
Jessica Day, Joseph M. Gabriel, Austin Spitz, Jeffrey Harman, “Racial Disparities in Pain Medication Prescribed for Injury during Emergency Department Visits.” Journal of Emergency Medicine. 2025.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel and Gabriella Rivera, “The Pharmaceutical Industry and the Growth of Clinical/Biomedical Research.” Oxford Bibliographies in History of Medicine. Ed. Jacalyn Duffin. New York: Oxford University Press. 2025
-
Lauren Thompson, Joseph M. Gabriel, et. al., Legal brief regarding mifepristone GenBioPro, Inc., v. Mark A. Sorsaia (Prosecuting Attorney of Putnam County) and Patrick Morrisey (Attorney General of West Virginia) (2024)
-
#Joseph M. Gabriel and Sukumar P. Desai, “’The Warmth of His Continuing Interest’: Henry K. Beecher, the Bioethics Revolution, and Pharmaceutical Industry Funding of Academic Medical Science in Cold War America” Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 78:2 (2023), 191-2008
-
Joseph M. Gabriel and Bennett Holman, “Clinical Trials and the Origins of Pharmaceutical Fraud: Parke, Davis & Company, Virtue Epistemology, and the History of the Fundamental Antagonism,” History of Science 58:4 (2020), 533-558.
-
David Herzberg and Joseph M. Gabriel, Letter re proposed Purdue settlement, Re: Purdue Pharma L.P., et al, Case No. 19-23649 (RDD) (2020)
-
Christopher McKnight Nichols, Nancy Bristow, E. Thomas Ewing, Joseph M. Gabriel, Benjamin C. Montoya, Elizabeth Outka, “Conceptualizing and Teaching the 1918-19 Influenza Pandemic in the Age of COVID-19,” Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era 19:4 (2020), 642-672.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Jacob Stegenga’s Medical Nihilism: Historical Scholarship and the Question of Efficacy” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 81 (2020).
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “George Urdang and the Future of History of Pharmacy” Pharmacy in History 61:3-4 (2019), 104-108.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Indian Secrets, Indian Cures, and the Early History of the United States Pharmacopoeia” in Crawford, M. and Gabriel, J.M., eds., Drugs on the Page: Pharmacopoeias and Healing Knowledge in the Early Modern Atlantic World (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019), 240-262.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Psychedelia and the History of the Chemical Sublime” in Temenuga Trifonova, ed., Contemporary Visual Culture and the Sublime (Routledge, 2017), 236-251.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Pharmaceutical Patenting and the Transformation of American Medical Ethics” British Journal of the History of Science 49:4 (2016), 577-600.
-
Nathan Crick and Joseph M. Gabriel, “Medical Narrative and the Rhetoric of Identification: The Many Faces of Anna White Dildane,” Health Communication 31:11 (2016), 1318-1326.
Additional Information
Joseph M. Gabriel is a historian of science, technology, and medicine. He also writes about bioethics and contemporary issues in medicine. Dr. Gabriel received his Ph.D. in 2006 from Rutgers University. Before coming to Florida State University he held a National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellowship in the Science Studies program at the University of California, San Diego. He has also taught at the University of Wisconsin, where he held the George Urdang Endowed Chair in the History of Pharmacy. He was the first person to hold an endowed chair in that field in the country and the first scholar in the humanities to achieve tenure at the College of Medicine. He is the recipient of the American Association for the History of Medicine’s Jack D. Pressman-Burroughs Wellcome Fund Award.
Dr. Gabriel has authored or co-authored more than 30 books, articles, book chapters, and legal briefs on the history of pharmaceuticals, clinical drug trials, academic medical science, and related topics. He is also interested in the history of public health, the history of addiction, legal history, narrative theory, and the history of ethics. He is the author of Medical Monopoly: Intellectual Property and the Origins of the Modern Pharmaceutical Industry (University of Chicago Press, 2014), co-author of Electronics: The Lifestory of a Technology (The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007) and co-editor of Drugs on the Page: Pharmacopeias and Healing Knowledge in the Early Modern Atlantic World. His most recent book, co-edited with David Herzberg and Nils Kessel, is Risk/Benefit: History from the Border Between Licit and Illicit Drugs (University of Rochester Press, forthcoming).
|
Rutgers University Ph.D., Department of History |
2006 |
|
University of Massachusetts at Amherst M.A., History |
1999 |
|
University of Massachusetts at Amherst B.A., Philosophy |
1992 |
- Matthew Crawford and Joseph M. Gabriel, eds. Drugs on the Page: Pharmacopeias and Healing Knowledge in the Early Modern Atlantic World (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019)
- Joseph M. Gabriel, Medical Monopoly: Intellectual Property Rights and the Origins of the Modern Pharmaceutical Industry (University of Chicago Press, 2014)
- Joseph M. Gabriel, “Ehrlich’s Dangerous Magic: Salvarsan, Innovation, and Narrative” in Kessel, N., Gabriel, J. and Herzberg, D., eds., Risk/Benefit: History from the Medicine and Drug Divide. Forthcoming.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Thick Concepts and Pharmaceutical Industry Corruption” in Joel Faintuch (Sao Paulo University) and Salomao Faintuch (Harvard Medical School), eds., Business Ethics in the Healthcare Industry. Springer. 2026
-
Jessica Day, Joseph M. Gabriel, Austin Spitz, Jeffrey Harman, “Racial Disparities in Pain Medication Prescribed for Injury during Emergency Department Visits.” Journal of Emergency Medicine. 2025.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel and Gabriella Rivera, “The Pharmaceutical Industry and the Growth of Clinical/Biomedical Research.” Oxford Bibliographies in History of Medicine. Ed. Jacalyn Duffin. New York: Oxford University Press. 2025
-
Lauren Thompson, Joseph M. Gabriel, et. al., Legal brief regarding mifepristone GenBioPro, Inc., v. Mark A. Sorsaia (Prosecuting Attorney of Putnam County) and Patrick Morrisey (Attorney General of West Virginia) (2024)
-
#Joseph M. Gabriel and Sukumar P. Desai, “’The Warmth of His Continuing Interest’: Henry K. Beecher, the Bioethics Revolution, and Pharmaceutical Industry Funding of Academic Medical Science in Cold War America” Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 78:2 (2023), 191-2008
-
Joseph M. Gabriel and Bennett Holman, “Clinical Trials and the Origins of Pharmaceutical Fraud: Parke, Davis & Company, Virtue Epistemology, and the History of the Fundamental Antagonism,” History of Science 58:4 (2020), 533-558.
-
David Herzberg and Joseph M. Gabriel, Letter re proposed Purdue settlement, Re: Purdue Pharma L.P., et al, Case No. 19-23649 (RDD) (2020)
-
Christopher McKnight Nichols, Nancy Bristow, E. Thomas Ewing, Joseph M. Gabriel, Benjamin C. Montoya, Elizabeth Outka, “Conceptualizing and Teaching the 1918-19 Influenza Pandemic in the Age of COVID-19,” Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era 19:4 (2020), 642-672.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Jacob Stegenga’s Medical Nihilism: Historical Scholarship and the Question of Efficacy” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 81 (2020).
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “George Urdang and the Future of History of Pharmacy” Pharmacy in History 61:3-4 (2019), 104-108.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Indian Secrets, Indian Cures, and the Early History of the United States Pharmacopoeia” in Crawford, M. and Gabriel, J.M., eds., Drugs on the Page: Pharmacopoeias and Healing Knowledge in the Early Modern Atlantic World (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2019), 240-262.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Psychedelia and the History of the Chemical Sublime” in Temenuga Trifonova, ed., Contemporary Visual Culture and the Sublime (Routledge, 2017), 236-251.
-
Joseph M. Gabriel, “Pharmaceutical Patenting and the Transformation of American Medical Ethics” British Journal of the History of Science 49:4 (2016), 577-600.
-
Nathan Crick and Joseph M. Gabriel, “Medical Narrative and the Rhetoric of Identification: The Many Faces of Anna White Dildane,” Health Communication 31:11 (2016), 1318-1326.