Slavery Origins of Gynecology with Deirdre Cooper Owens

Professor Deirdre Cooper Owens discusses her book, Medical Bondage: Race, Gender and the Origins of American Gynecology, which traces the origins of American reproductive health to slave hospitals. As white doctors expanded their practices onto plantations, quickly pregnancy and birth became the focus of their practices. Dr. James Marion Sims with other nineteenth-century gynecologists performed experimental caesarean sections, ovariotomies, and obstetric fistula repairs primarily on enslaved women. While revolutionizing medical care, these doctors experimented and tortured enslaved women while creating groundless medical theories related to whiteness and blackness, men and women, and the inferiority of other races or nationalities.
Deirdre Cooper Owens is a Professor of History at University of Connecticut.
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The Cleveland Heights-University Heights Library's 1619 Project discussion group meets every second Thursday of the month. We discuss how the legacy of slavery remains a dominant factor of American political, cultural, and social spheres. The library program centers on the articles included in the New York Times Special Sunday Magazine dated August 20, 2019.
The program began in October 2019 and has had over 500 people participate. All interviews done by John Piche'.
For upcoming programs, additional readings, and resource lists please visit Heights Library's 1619 Project Discussion page heightslibrary.org/services/1...
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Music by Controller 7
controller7.bandcamp.com/