Medical Bondage: Race, Gender, and the Origins of American Gynecology

Deirdre Cooper Owens, Queens College CUNY Graduate Center, February 14, 2018Deirdre Cooper Owens reads a section from her recent work, Medical Bondage: Race, Gender, and the Origins of American Gynecology, which explores the intersections of slavery, capitalism, and medicine and discusses the work with Jennifer Morgan, Professor of History New York University  and Sasha Turner Bryson, Professor of History at Quinnipiac University. Owen’s study draws from the journals of doctors like James Marion Sims and examines the labor enslaved women performed as they endured medical experimentation and assisted doctors in developing careers in gynecology. This talk took place on February 14, 2018, sponsored by Center for the Study of Women and Society and co-sponsored with the Institute for Research on the African Diaspora in the Americas and the Caribbean (IRADAC), the CUNY Graduate Center Ph.D. Program in History, and the Feminist Press.