News at the Centre for the History of Medicine
Traumatised Minds: Neurosis and Hysteria in Soviet Medicine and Culture, 1971-1953
The call for papers is out for Dr Anna Toropova's Cultures of Trauma Workshop, 8-9 May 2025. More information and to apply here.
She is also recruiting for a Research Fellow for a 2-year fixed term contract, starting 1 September 2025. Apply here
Find out more about the Traumatised Minds: Neurosis and Hysteria in Soviet Medicine and Culture, 1971-1953 research project here.
Anniversary fever? History and the culture of NHS celebration
Congratulations to Roberta Bivins and Mathew Thomson who have had their article about NHS anniversaries published in Modern British History.
This was drawn from reflections from The Cultural History of the NHS research project.
Abstract
Delivered a day after Britain’s National Health Service (NHS) reached its 75th year since its opening on the Appointed Day of 5 July 1948, the Pimlott Lecture for 2023 explored the culture of NHS anniversary-making. What can the marking of these anniversaries tell us about changing attitudes towards the service, and indeed, the British state? Here, examining evidence from the media, government archives, and Mass Observation, we argue that NHS anniversaries have long functioned as points of reflection but that their role as moments of national celebration and even communion has come to the fore only recently and culminated in the apparent ‘anniversary fever’ of 2018. We will explore the reasons behind the growing public fervour, what it can tell us, and the lessons offered by our work on this (still) best-loved of British institutions for historians working on highly politicized objects in ‘fevered’ times.
"Low Risk Doesn't Mean No Risk": The Making of Lesbian Safer-Sex and the Creation of New (S)experts in the Late Twentieth Century
We are happy to announce that 'The Cultural History of the NHS' project continues to bear fruit!
Dr Hannah Elizabeth, one of our postdoctoral Fellows, has just published their chapter, '“Low Risk Doesn’t Mean No Risk”: The Making of Lesbian Safer-Sex and the Creation of New (S)experts in the Late Twentieth Century' (open access here), an exciting piece of work informed by and begun during their time with us here at CHM!
Dr Elizabeth is now a Fellow on Dr Rebecca Wright's fantastic Wellcome Trust funded Project Carbon Bodies: Warmth and Fuelling Health in Britain, 1918 to 2022 at the University of Northumbria.