To celebrate Anzac Day, Ellen Cresswell reflects on the uncertainty and anxieties soldiers’ mothers experienced for their sons during World War I. There is no word in English, French, or German for a mother who has lost her child. “Widow” … Continue reading
Mimi Petrakis examines the issue of mental illness in academia as part of our continuing series on history and mental health. My psychologist once called academia “a mental illness factory” and I remember laughing. As someone who had struggled with … Continue reading
As part of our mental health series, Catharine Coleborne considers the histories of institutionalised women and the relationship between researcher, historical subject and archive. In recent years historians have re-imagined the archive as what I call an ‘unstable’ site for … Continue reading
Effie Karageorgos investigates male psychological trauma in the Boer War as part of our series on mental health. On 28 April 1902, Edgar Robert Howell, a 30-year-old banker from Armidale, New South Wales, travelled to Sydney to enlist in the … Continue reading
Continuing our mental health series, Philippa Martyr shares her research on the female experience of leucotomy in twentieth-century Western Australia. Psychosurgery – especially leucotomy (called lobotomy in the US) – is probably one of the most misunderstood elements in twentieth … Continue reading
Dolly MacKinnon explores auditory constructions of female madness in the start of our series on the history of women and mental health. From the claim a woman sounds ‘hysterical’ to having their opinions met with the colloquialism ‘mad cow’, women … Continue reading
VIDA’s What I wish I’d known series continues with advice from Christina Twomey for those ECRs on the academic job market. The road to hell is paved with comparing yourself to other people. Perhaps advice columns come a close second, … Continue reading
Clement Masakure reflects on the history of the segregated nursing profession in Southern Rhodesia (colonial Zimbabwe) during the 1930s and 1940s. The colonial hospitals of Central and Southern Africa are an important space to analyse, among other things, the experiences … Continue reading
Caitlin Adams reviews a recent symposium offering historical and contemporary perspectives towards mothering and motherhood in Australia. On the first day of the Australian Mothering in Contemporary and Historical Perspective Symposium, held at The University of Melbourne between February 15 … Continue reading
Sharon Crozier-de Rosa reflects on her latest book, Shame and the Anti-Feminist Backlash: Britain, Ireland and Australia, 1890-1920 (2018, Routledge). From the 1880s to the 1910s, novelist Marie Corelli reigned as ‘Queen of the Bestsellers’, far outselling any fellow authors … Continue reading