In October 2024, then-presidential candidate Donald Trump stood before his gathered rally attendees and made a promise: he would build […]
“They say that all women have the same apprehension”: Anxiety and Isolation in Seventeenth-Century Pregnancy
On August 19th, 1620, a young noblewoman sat alone in her château in Bayon, Lorraine. She was heavily pregnant with […]
RFK’s ideas about “wellness farms” for young people are eugenic and unconstitutional
Before he became Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. touted an idea about […]
Feminism in the Time of the Technological Womb
The artificial womb. The embryo outside the mother. Ectogenesis, if we’re being technical. I was first exposed to this exploratory […]
Challenging the “Great Man” Narrative: Imagining the Voices of Women in the History of Sex and Reproduction
Historians of marginalized groups face a common problem: the people about whom they want to write often did not leave […]
‘The Moral Ideas of the Community’: Censorship and Irish-Catholic Nation Building
Though Ireland has never had an official state religion, Catholicism played a prominent role in shaping the nation during its […]
Gone to China: Risk and Reward in the Travel Diaries of Martha Foster Crawford
Martha Foster Crawford thought that she would literally die. Hagiographical stories of missionary wives who had succumbed in the foreign […]
I’ll Be Right Here: Disability Intimacy & Medical Trauma in E.T.
Steven Spielberg’s 1982 E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial was an integral part of my family’s classic movies, a list that also included […]
Periods on the Table: Taking stock of the menstrual equity movement in Canada
In Canada, it seems that “period” is no longer a dirty word. Since the Canadian Menstruators pushed to remove the […]
“The Relationship Between Public Morals and Public Toilets”: Christine Jorgensen and the Birth of Trans Bathroom Panic
Christine Jorgensen was used to unwelcome attention, but this was a new level of outrage. After undergoing hormone therapy and […]
