ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the fundamental importance of anatomy historically in forming the original material base for the cognitive exclusiveness of the profession. Dissection is anticipated by students long before they get to the Dissecting Room (DR), as was shown by the questions put by sixth-formers at the Open Day and is emphasised by other ethnographers of the DR. The day-to-day running of the DR is the responsibility of the two male technicians, while the demonstrators who teach and examine students are both men and women. Students have to wear a white coat in the DR; with the decrease in practical exercises of all kinds, particularly in laboratories, dissection is by some margin the main occasion for wearing this distinguishing uniform of the scientist and the doctor. The professional disposition of Responsibility, with its combined elements of ownership and action, is also practised in the DR.
