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sparklefarm's review
DNFing after the first chapter - no one's more surprised than me! This seemed right up my alley. But it seemed to be more dense academic theory than Mary Roach-esque, which I guess is what I wanted. The first chapter is supposed to set the stage, explain the world in which experts give advice to women. But it read like a masters thesis to me, and that's not what I'm into these days. Also a very "I'm not like other feminists" vibe.
prof_shoff's review
3.0
While informative and often infuriating, the writing wasn't as engaging as one would expect for such an interesting topic.
town_scar's review
2.0
I couldn't finish it. The subject is fascinating but the writing style is very ... unnecessary. As my mom put it: "I felt out of my depths reading it. And if you felt out of your depths as a woman who has taken numerous women's studies courses at your (women's) college, imagine how out of my depths I felt!"
My mother and I are both very well read and yet neither of us could get through it. This book wasn't written for the common woman. It's almost like it was exclusively written for experts, ironically.
My mother and I are both very well read and yet neither of us could get through it. This book wasn't written for the common woman. It's almost like it was exclusively written for experts, ironically.
janadelbosco's review against another edition
5.0
Un ensayo escrito de manera casi narrativa que se lee con agilidad y mucha curiosidad. Con bastante documentación y un hilo muy claro, se aborda un tema tan poco reconocido como es, básicamente, el robo sistemático y organizado por parte del "nuevo patriarcado" (organizado alrededor de los hombres especialistas) de conocimientos y espacios propios de las mujeres, con el fin de comercializarlos o, simplemente, expropiárselos. Este texto pone a pensar al lector y le abre toda un área sobre la que probablemente no había reflexionado. Arranca prejuicios sobre la situación de la mujer en los últimos siglos (ni siempre ni todas fueron amas de casa semi-ociosas) y revela el peligro potencial de la ciencia que se presenta como objetiva y absoluta y con ese pretexto se convierte casi en otra religión. Haciendo un repaso desde los cambios producidos entre la sociedad pre-industrial y la industrial, y presentando los distintos conceptos que hubo sobre la mujer por parte de los hombres (de los expertos) a lo largo del siglo XIX y de la primera mitad del siglo XX, estas dos autoras exponen de forma, en mi opinióm, muy eficaz (y de importancia aún ahora, décadas después) un ámbito más de la opresión patriarcal.
mondovertigo's review
challenging
informative
reflective
slow-paced
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness, Racism, Medical trauma, Medical content, and Misogyny
Moderate: Pregnancy
Minor: Abortion
ejdecoster's review against another edition
2.0
Interesting content but the tone was very academic, lacking the dry wit I typically associate with Ehrenreich's writing. Not a negative, necessarily, but not quite what I was looking for.
carriekellenberger's review
5.0
An eye-opening and very informative account of how women have been treated over the past two centuries in the medical industry. Ehrenreich takes us through the history of the establishment of the medical industry, how to raise children, how feminism changed and adapted over the centuries, and up to modern society and how women are viewed.
There are sections on female health, the 'rise of sick and languishing women', how they were treated, the creation of home economics and its importance, how to rear children and suggestions suggestions on how to be the perfect wife, and more. All of it is annotated and researched with a giant footnote section in the end to refer to.
For Her Own Good: Two Centuries of Experts' Advice to Women demonstrates how attitudes towards women in the health industry started and how these attitudes have remained. These biases are still well and thriving in the medical industry today.
From looking at how the medical establishment was created (upper class white men who had money to go to university, but did not study anatomy or how to treat illnesses) to how midwives were vilified, removed, and replaced by men with no knowledge of female anatomy to male doctors dismissing women as hysterical and 'doctors' who specialized in the 'psychologically abnormal' experience of being a woman - this book will hit a lot of nerves!
For a book that was first published in 1978, this book has aged fairly well. Very informative and a great read.
Best Takeaway Fact
"With a patriarchal self-confidence that had almost no further need of instruments, techniques, medications, Osler wrote:
If a poor lass, paralyzed apparently, helpless, bed-ridden for years, comes to me, having worn out in mind, body, and estate a devoted family; if she in a few weeks or less by faith in me, and faith alone, takes up her bed and walks, the saints of old could not have done more... ~Sir William Osler
Now at last the medical profession had arrived at a method of faith-healing potent enough to compare with women's traditional healing - but one which was decisively masculine. It did not require a nurturant attitude, nor long hours by the patient's bedside. In fact, with the new style of healing, the less time a doctor spends with a patient, and the fewer questions he permits, the greater his powers would seem to be."
There are sections on female health, the 'rise of sick and languishing women', how they were treated, the creation of home economics and its importance, how to rear children and suggestions suggestions on how to be the perfect wife, and more. All of it is annotated and researched with a giant footnote section in the end to refer to.
For Her Own Good: Two Centuries of Experts' Advice to Women demonstrates how attitudes towards women in the health industry started and how these attitudes have remained. These biases are still well and thriving in the medical industry today.
From looking at how the medical establishment was created (upper class white men who had money to go to university, but did not study anatomy or how to treat illnesses) to how midwives were vilified, removed, and replaced by men with no knowledge of female anatomy to male doctors dismissing women as hysterical and 'doctors' who specialized in the 'psychologically abnormal' experience of being a woman - this book will hit a lot of nerves!
For a book that was first published in 1978, this book has aged fairly well. Very informative and a great read.
Best Takeaway Fact
"With a patriarchal self-confidence that had almost no further need of instruments, techniques, medications, Osler wrote:
If a poor lass, paralyzed apparently, helpless, bed-ridden for years, comes to me, having worn out in mind, body, and estate a devoted family; if she in a few weeks or less by faith in me, and faith alone, takes up her bed and walks, the saints of old could not have done more... ~Sir William Osler
Now at last the medical profession had arrived at a method of faith-healing potent enough to compare with women's traditional healing - but one which was decisively masculine. It did not require a nurturant attitude, nor long hours by the patient's bedside. In fact, with the new style of healing, the less time a doctor spends with a patient, and the fewer questions he permits, the greater his powers would seem to be."