The Culture of Physic: Women's Writing and Medicine in Early Modern England (O)

3 ch (3S) (W) · Undergraduate

Examine how the textual practices associated with medical care and knowledge infiltrated women’s literary writing. Diagno sis of illness, making medicines, and preventing disease were recognized as essential knowledge for seventeenth - century mothers and housewives, and women practised medicine at home and as professional practitioners. Beginning with feminist critiques of med icine and relevant history of medicine scholarship, readings explore how early modern autobiography, poetry, fiction, and drama consider reproductive care, childbirth, disease, sociability, disability, race, and empire. NOTE: Open to ENGL Honours Students.