Encountering Maude Abbott

The author explores the ways in which traditional approaches to biography have inscribed and reinforced gendered hierarchies in medicine. She points out that like many other accomplished women, the life story of Canadian cardiologist Maude Abbott (1869-1940) has been told through narratives of constraint. For example, she notes that existing biographies of Abbott have focused on her relationship to famous men, such as her cousin Prime Minister John Abbott; her mentor, the distinguished physician William Osler; her benefactor, the philanthropist Lord Strathcona; and her nemesis, the pathologist Horst Oertel. Abbott’s biographers, the author maintains, have granted her negligible agency in how her life unfolded. The author suggests that a material culture approach to Abbott’s life, inspired by feminist art and architectural history, means focusing on alternative sources, in particular buildings, artefacts, and representations, rather than the obstacles Abbott faced and the men who supported or rejected her. The author argues that this trans-disciplinary method, which both encounters Abbott’s lived experiences and counters traditional narratives, allows us to assess her work in new ways. For example, she points out, Abbott’s research generated global networks and was foundational in the rise of the medical museum, her magnum opus. The author concludes that such an approach offers new insights into the ways in which the Medical Humanities, and in particular the history of medicine, are entwined with feminist thought and agency.

Feminist Encounters: A Journal of Critical Studies in Culture and Politics

Vol. 2

no. 2

21-38

2018

en