Women Gain a Place in Medicine Edythe Lutzker

Irish Medical Women c.1880s-1920s: The origins, education and careers of early women medical graduates from Irish institutions

Though Harley Street has been viewed as the provenance of the medical
elite in Britain, no attempt has been made to systematically examine this
elite in its historical context or to consider the veracity of this view. Hence,
this thesis reconstructs the totality of all the male (n = 657) and female (n =
24) medical practitioners who arrived in Harley Street from 1845-1914 by
undertaking a prosopographical analysis and contextualising the historical
background in which they lived and worked. Over the course of the
nineteenth century, Harley Street became a progressively more fashionable
choice for medical practitioners wishing to establish a practice in London
and in most cases, this address represented the pinnacle of their career
trajectory. It is argued here that an elite medical enclave did, indeed,
establish itself in this geographical area during the period. The group's
reputation was assessed through their medical qualifications, scholarships,
prizes, teaching and hospital posts, publications, public lectures and their
role in medical societies.
Harley Street medical practitioners differed from other London
medical practitioners because they published more material (85 of the
cohort in general and 93 percent of the cohort who qualified MD published
their work, in contrast to up to 50 per cent of London medical practitioners),
had more prestigious qualifications (86 per cent were qualified MD, MB,
FRCP, FRCS or MRCP in contrast to approximately 25 per cent in Greater
London), were members of medical societies (almost 90 per cent of the cohort
in contrast to between 40 and 50 per cent of GPs in Britain), created new medical specialities, established specialist hospitals, took prominent roles in
medical societies and delivered renowned public lectures that were
published in the main medical journals. Moreover, this group wielded
considerable collective editorial control in a wide range of medical
publications. Hence, their efforts greatly facilitated the professionalisation
of medicine in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Through
their senior hospital and teaching posts the cohort had an important
influence on the next generation of medical practitioners, as these
connections were crucial in attracting new medical practitioners to the
Street. This thesis, therefore, determines whether Harley Street can be
regarded as a measure of the medical elite.

A measure of the elite : a history of medical practitioners in Harley Street, 1845-1914

My paper seeks to explore the wide-ranging influence of institutionalized patriarchy and its ideology in constructing and strengthening gendered notions of science particularly medicine in Britain, Europe and United States especially during the First and Second World Wars. Even after the end of these wars and return of peace, women continued to be relegated to the domestic arena despite their conspicuous medical roles. Dubbed as sexualized bodies with inferior intellectual abilities, they continued to be denied admission in medical colleges and jobs. My argument shall be illustrated with examples from women’s struggles for medical education in the imperialist countries and the colonized countries namely India. The processes were complex and different in each terrain depending upon the dynamics of cultural and nationalist forces. In the course of discussion, debates regarding women’s struggle for medical education and for equal status as full-fledged missionaries and professional identity as institution—builders, surgeons and gynecologists shall figure in. It shall include references to the rabid hostility of their male colleagues and students. The story of Christian Medical College in Ludhiana (Punjab, India), founded and nourished by a Baptist missionary, Edith Brown, provides the best example of the tension between misogynist notions of women’s intellectual caliber and their success as medical doctors, professional surgeons and administrators during periods of crisis such as wars and massacres during the partition of Punjab (1947). Their success, though partial, in modernizing notions of disease and women’s health, has long-term implications for medical traditions in India.

Women Gain a Place in Medicine Edythe Lutzker

Citations

Irish Medical Women c.1880s-1920s: The origins, education and careers of early women medical graduates from Irish institutions

A measure of the elite : a history of medical practitioners in Harley Street, 1845-1914

Patriarchy and Medicine: A Woman Medical Missionary in the Colonial Punjab

References

Irish Medical Women c.1880s-1920s: The origins, education and careers of early women medical graduates from Irish institutions

A measure of the elite : a history of medical practitioners in Harley Street, 1845-1914