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From the incredible focus on Hilary Clinton’s cough as she was running for the US presidency, to Elizabeth 1st’s infamous speech “I may have the body of a weak and feeble woman”, the female body and its perceived ‘weakness’ has long been utilized as justification for the suppression of women.

Politicized and utilized against us in order to bolster a patriarchal system Women’s bodies have been manipulated, idealized, dissected and mutilated in the name of beauty, sexuality and medicine.

Through part 1 of this lecture we will explore the history of medicine from a female perspective, including the first female doctors, the ‘Wandering Uterus’ theory, the evolution of obstetrics and gynaecology, mythologies of witch-midwives and the history of abortion.