Tag Archives: nursing

History of Nursing Colloquium

Canadian nursing in Boer War (c) Wellcome Library, London

Canadian nurses in Boer War
(c) Wellcome Library, London

Call for Papers:

The UK Association for the History of Nursing Colloquium will be held on 4 July 2013 at the History Faculty, University of Oxford.  This year’s theme will explore the ‘History of Colonial and post-Colonial Nursing’.

The history of nursing presents a unique perspective from which to interrogate colonialism and post-colonialism. Simultaneously, viewing nursing’s development under colonial and post-colonial rule can reveal the different faces of what, on the surface may appear to be a profession that is consistent and coherent yet in reality has many different faces and is constantly in the process of reinventing itself. Considering such areas as transnational relationships, class, gender, race, and politics this colloquium aims to present current work in progress within this field to better understand the complex entanglements in the development of nursing as it was imagined and practised in local imperial, colonial and post-colonial contexts. The colloquium will be led by Dr Helen Sweet and will be opened with a keynote paper on the colloquium’s theme by Professor Anne Marie Rafferty.

Please submit abstracts of approximately 250 words, by Friday 1 February 2013, to:

Christine.Hallett@manchester.ac.uk

N.B. As this promises to be a particularly popular colloquium and the audience capacity is strictly limited to max. 60 people, places will be allocated on a strictly ‘first come, first served’ basis so you are strongly advised to book early!

Price:  £10 for students and £15 for non-students.

There will also be a workshop for PhD students and their supervisors on Wednesday, 3 July, to be held at the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, University of Oxford.

All enquiries to: Christine.Hallett@manchester.ac.uk

Related Links Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, Oxford | Oxford University History Faculty

New books in the library – war surgery, Spanish flu and more

This week we have some new books in the library and a varity of history of medicine topics:

  • American Pandemic: the lost world of the 1918 influenza epidemic by Nancy K Bristow (OUP, 2012) RA640.I6 BRI 2012

OUP describe the book as a

…much-needed corrective to the silence surrounding the influenza outbreak. It sheds light on the social and cultural history of Americans during the pandemic, uncovering both the causes of the nation’s public amnesia and the depth of the quiet remembering that endured. Focused on the primary players in this drama–patients and their families, friends, and community, public health experts, and health care professionals–historian Nancy K. Bristow draws on multiple perspectives to highlight the complex interplay between social identity, cultural norms, memory, and the epidemic.

If you like this, you might also like to read Phillips and Killingray’s edited volume The Spanish Influenza Pandemic of 1918-19: news perspectives (RD150.4 SPA 2003)

  • War Surgery 1914-1918 by Thomas Scotland and Steven Hey (eds) (Helion, 2012) RD WAR 2012

History blogger James Daly describes the edited volume enthusiastically:

This is a brilliant book. Considering that the editors and contributors are medical professionals, it reads incredibly well as a history book – much more readable than many a military history text!

As well as a number of detailed tables, the books includes a variety of photos, include some particularly gory ones of post-surgery intestines.

  • For the Health of the Enslaved: slaves, medicine and power in the Danish West Indies, 1803-1848 by Niklas Thode Jensen (Museum Tusculanum Press, 2012) RA456.V57 JEN 2012

Danish publishers Museum Tusculanum Press summarise the text:

Through a series of case studies the author demonstrates how the Danish West Indian government implemented policies of medical control concerning the enslaved, but also that this did not take place without resistance. Opposing perceptions of health and interests of economy and security clashed in the colonial situation. The investigations reveal that in a comparative Caribbean perspective, Danish West Indian health policies were often quite unique and successful, but also that the health of the enslaved was a contested field staging an ongoing power struggle between the planters, the colonial administration and the slaves themselves in the waning years of human bondage in the New World.

The four page table of contents is available to view online – it gives a good overview of the areas covered in the book.

  • Infectious Disease in India, 1892-1940 : policy-making and the perception of risk by Sandhya L. Polu (Palgrave Macmillan, 2012) RA643.7.I4 POL 2012

The contents, introduction and index to this book are available to read online for free, via the publisher’s website.  Polu examines various diseases, including malaria, cholera and yellow fever and uses them to

analyze how factors such as health diplomacy, epidemiology, trade, imperial governance, medical technologies, and cultural norms, operated within global and colonial conceptions of risk to shape infectious disease policies in colonial India. (More on Palgrave Macmillan’s site)

Related Links: Recommend a book for the library to purchase | Search SOLO library catalogue | Contact us to make an appointment to visit the library | See all our new books on LibraryThing

New book in the Wellcome Unit Library

Today we received a new book for the library:

A nurse at the front: the Great War diaries of Sister Edith Appleton
edited by Ruth Cohen (Imperial War Museum, 2012).
Shelfmark: D630.A66 APP 2012

Edith Appleton, or Edie, was a nurse on on the front line during the First World War.  She worked in military hospitals and casualty clearing stations in France and Belgium from 1914-1919 and kept detailed diaries.  Her diaries are presented in this volume along with a foreword from Michael Morpurgo, introduction from editor Ruth Cohen and an appendix by Sue Light on British Military Nurses in the Great War.

Edie recounts details of her personal life and reaction to her experiences along with  details of the casualties, their injuries and the medical staff.   An extract of the book is available to read for free online.  Sue Light’s appedix is available online for free from the Western Front Association.

Accompanying information is available online from http://www.edithappleton.org.uk/.  This includes photographs of the original diaries, an index list of the people mentioned in the diaries and other biographical information about Edith Appleton.

Related Links: Edit Appleton’s homepage | Western Front Association | Sue Light’s Scarlet Finders website (about military nurses) | Wellcome Unit Library homepage | new books at the Wellcome Unit Library