In the summer of 1782, Don Juan de Luna, a respected elder citizen of the City of Mexico, nearly choked […]
New Medical Tourism on St. Kitts
The late William Halford of Southern Illinois University’s School of Medicine spent his life developing what Hollywood director Agustín Fernández […]
Remembering the Mothers of Gynecology: Deirdre Cooper Owens’ Medical Bondage: Race, Gender, and the Origins of American Gynecology
Antebellum physician James Marion Sims has been in the news quite a bit lately as a target of activism. After […]
Dying to Heal: Women and Syphilis in Colonial Lima, Peru
In the early modern world, syphilis victims suffered through four stages of disease over a ten- to thirty-year time span. […]
The Politics of Sobreparto: Beyond the Medical Dimensions of a Postpartum Condition
Migrant indigenous Andean women living in the lowland Bolivian city of Santa Cruz de la Sierra often mention sobreparto (“following […]
Health Care in Colonial Peruvian Convents
Last May I had the opportunity to conduct archival research in Arequipa, Peru. I went in search of fodder for […]
My Experiences with Auto-Immunity and Why I Dislike the Term “Able-Bodied”
I dislike the term “able-bodied.” I see this term used frequently in academic and activist scholarship, as well as everyday […]
Mothers’ Natures: Sex, Love, and Degeneration in the Nineteenth-Century United States
Every so often, some viral article or other will declare that science “proves” or “confirms” that intelligence is inherited from […]
The Eye at War: American Eye Prosthetics During the World Wars
In December 1943 Colonel Derrick Vail, ophthalmologist and consultant to the Army Medical Department in Europe, wrote in a memo: […]
Renée Zellweger, Isabelle Dinoire, and the Stakes for Changing the Face
On October 20, 2014, Renée Zellweger attended the Elle Women in Hollywood event, her first appearance in the public eye […]
