Das Thema. Hervorgehoben Zu Werden Verdienen Auch Die
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das Thema. Hervorgehoben zu werden verdienen auch die vertiefenden Aufsätze von Mylène Ruoss und Bechtold Weber zu den Schmuckfenstern in Gessners Wohnhaus und zum Wappenbrief, den Gessner und seine Verwandten vom Kaiser erhielten. Auch dieser gut lesbare und reich illustrierte Band wurde vom Verlag an- sprechend gestaltet und verfügt neben einem gesonderten Literaturverzeichnis auch über ein Personenregister. Tilmann Walter, Institut für Geschichte der Medizin der Universität Würzburg (DE) Nelson, Jennifer: More than Medicine. A History of the Feminist Women’s Health Movement. New York; London, New York University Press, 2015. 280 p. $ 26.–. ISBN 978-0-8147-7066-5 (e-book available) The history of US Women Health Movement was told by numerous historians, among them Sheryl Burt Ruzek (The Women Health Movement, Preager 1978), Sandra Morgan (Into Our Own Hands, Rutgers University Press, 2002), Wendy Kline (Bodies of Knowledge, University of Chicago Press, 2010), and Michele Murphy (Seizing the Means of Reproduction, Duke University Press, 2013). Jennifer Nelson adds a new dimension to this story by focalizing on two cities, Seattle and Atlanta, and on links between the Women Liberation Movement, the New Left, and the Black Movement, with a strong accent on the latter. Nelson’s previous book, Women of Color and the Reproductive Rights Movement (New York University Press, 2003), investigated already intersections between Black Movement and Women Health Movement. More Than Medicine develops and enriches this topic through a detailed examination of local developments. The title “more than medicine” may be read as referring to social medicine’s claim that health is linked with issues such as housing, nutrition, sanitation, work conditions or education. In Nelson’s book, how- ever, “more” refers more specifically to the history of racial relations in the US and their broader socio-economic and cultural underpinnings. More Than Medicine will be probably classified in the health section of libraries; it may be equally legitimate to classify it the US policy/racial policy section. The strong focus on intersections between Black Liberation Movement and Wom- en’s Health Movement is at the same time the book’s strength and a potential weak- ness. Nelson investigates a little studied topic and provides a wealth of information on it. On the other hand, readers who do not specialize in American studies, are not familiar with details of political developments in the US in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, and are mainly interested in history and sociology of medicine may find parts of the book too remote from their direct preoccupations. This will be regrettable, because More Than Medicine tells an interesting story of an unique encounter between health related activism and a broader social movement. Women’s reproductive rights are at the very center of the activity of women’s health movement in Seattle and Atlanta. One of the important innovations of the US women’s health movement was “menstrual extraction” – the elimination, by aspira- tion, of the content of the uterus of a woman with a delayed period, often without testing whether she is pregnant. Today a similar effect is achieved not by mechanical Gesnerus 74 (2017) 143 Downloaded from Brill.com09/27/2021 05:25:03PM via free access means but by drugs. Women can eliminate an early pregnancy with a combination misoprostol and mifepristone (RU486). The main difference is the context of appli- cation of these two methods. In countries in which abortion is legal, the “abortive pill” is distributed by health professional. Menstrual extraction was a self-help prac- tice linked, as Michelle Murphy has also shown, with bonding between women through the observation and exploration of their reproductive organs. Before the legalization of abortion in US in 1975, interruption of pregnancy was one of the main inter ventions of women health movement and in the late 1970s it continued to be one of the main activities of feminist clinics. Nelson stresses the difference between atti- tudes of White activists, who saw abortion mainly as an exercise of women’s right to decide whether she wants to become a mother, and Black ones, who had more com- plex attitude towards abortion, because of the historical memories of control of Black women’s fertility as an important tool of their subjugation as slaves. Moreover White women often argued that they did not wish to have a child in a given moment in their life because they wanted to do something else: study, travel, work. Black women often felt that they couldn’t have a child in a given moment of their lives, because they couldn’t afford it. For them an abortion was frequently not perceived as a liberation but as a bitter necessity. Abortion services provided by activist structure were an important service for women. These services were usually safe, but occasionally things went wrong. Nelson describes the crisis provoked in the Atlanta’s Feminist Women Health Centers (FWHC) in 1979, in the aftermath of three consecutive deaths produced by abortion. Two of these deaths were in all probability induced by incompetent admin- istration of anesthetics. These deaths were exploited by anti-abortion activists and led to restriction of provision of abortions by activists. In the 1980s, FWHC’s activism around abortion became more limited, and the majority of abortions took place in professional settings, mainly specialized clinics. However, with the advent of the AIDS crisis FWHC played an important role in management of health of women infected with the HIV virus. It opened a hot line for infected women, helped them to find the right treatment facilities, and stimulated research on women and AIDS. (p. 164–165). Nelson stresses that the involvement of Black women’s organizations such as Sister Song, and Black feminists, such as Loretta Ross, in the Women Health Movement changed the nature of this movement. It steered women’s health activism toward a greater involvement with economic and social issues, and increased the White activ- ists’ awareness of the role of poverty and discrimination in harming women’s and children’s health. More Than Medicine aspires to restore the important place of Black women in the women’s health movement, and elects therefore to put to the fore a very positive image of Black activism. Only rarely the book mentions more prob- lematic issues such as violence of Black men towards Black women. This is a very sen- sitive issue, because racism feeds on stereotype of the Black male as brutal and vio- lent. On the other hand, it is difficult to avoid this topic when dealing with women’s health. Nelson’s book ends on a very upbeat tone: it describes the important achieve- ments of Black activists in improving the health of women of color – and all the US women. Looking on the US from a Western European perspective these achieve- ments may seem somewhat less impressive. In Western Europe too, it is easier for a white middle class women to have access to quality health care and control their fer- 144 Gesnerus 74 (2017) Downloaded from Brill.com09/27/2021 05:25:03PM via free access tility then to lower class woman or “women of color” (although the latter category is somewhat more diffuse in Europe than in the US). Still, lower class women in Europe have (in average) better access to health care than women of similar status in the US, even with Obama care. In Europe and Canada lower class women are also at lower risk to became destitute when stricken by a severe illness, while the rise of religious conservatism did not lead (as for now) to important restrictions of abortion rights. Exemplary activism described by Nelson was indeed exemplary, but such an activism may be badly needed in 2016 too. Ilana Löwy, Centre de recherche médecine, sciences, santé, santé mentale, société, Paris (FR) Polianski, Igor J.: Das Schweigen der Ärzte. Eine Kulturgeschichte der sowjetischen Medizin und ihrer Ethik. Stuttgart, Franz Steiner, 2015. 439 S. Ill. (Kulturanamne- sen, Band 8). € 68.–. ISBN 978-3-515-11005-1 «Der sowjetische Arzt auf den Gerüsten und Dachsparren des sozialistischen Auf- baus – das bedeutet Prophylaxe und Massencharakter! Hoch lebe der Arzt als Kul- turarbeiter!» «Harter Kurs auf die Liquidierung des Arztgeheimnisses». Von solchen Zitaten wimmelte es in den sowjetischen Zeitungen der 1920er Jahre. Igor Polianski analysiert sie und eine beachtliche Fülle von Quellen aus Politik, Medizin, Philo- sophie, Literatur und Film in seiner an der Universität Ulm eingereichten Habili- tationsschrift. Stark von Michel Foucault inspiriert, gliedert er die sowjetische Ge- schichte je nach den herrschenden Techniken zur Erzeugung sozial erwünschten Verhaltens: Die Zeit nach der Oktoberrevolution wurde durch den Glauben an die rationa listische Erzieh- und Steuerbarkeit der Menschen(-massen) geprägt. Oberhand ge- wannen dadurch die auf Prophylaxe ausgerichtete Sanitätsmedizin, Schreibtischärzte und Gesundheitspolitiker. Sie alle gingen davon aus, dass im Sozialismus Krankhei- ten und die als «fruchtloses Zusammenflicken» empfundene kurative Medizin ver- schwinden würden. Die Strukturen der Gesundheitsversorgung wurden zerschlagen, der Doktortitel 1918 zwecks Aufhebung der Klassenunterschiede aberkannt. Viele Ärzte arbeiteten für einen schlechten Lohn an einer Poliklinik, wo sie sich den At- tacken gewaltbereiter Patienten ausgeliefert sahen, deren Ansprüche sie nicht befrie- digen konnten. Im Jahrzehnt nach der «großen Umwälzung» von 1929 und des Terrors verloren die Ärzte den letzten Rest an gesellschaftlicher Anerkennung. Literatur und Film stellten sie als Antihelden dar, als bürgerliche Ewiggestrige oder gar als Giftmischer. Ironischerweise wuchsen ausgerechnet im «Großen Vaterländischen Krieg» (1941– 1945) die Machtbefugnisse der Ärzte und der Respekt, die Dankbarkeit und das Ver- trauen ihnen gegenüber. Die Kontrollmechanismen verschoben sich von der staat- lichen Reglementierung hin zur kollektiven (ärztliches Berufsethos) und individuel- len (ärztliche Haltung) Selbststeuerung. In der Nachkriegszeit konnten die Ärzte ihre wieder gewonnene professionelle Autonomie bewahren und ausbauen.