Vancouver Island University researchers are shining a spotlight on the ways in which gender has played a consistent role in determining what forms of healing and caring are recognized, institutionalized and rewarded.
VIU’s Dr. Cheryl Krasnick Warsh, Dr. Cathryn Spence, Dr. Katharine Rollwagen and Dr. Whitney Wood worked with Dr. Kristin Burnett from Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, Ontario; Dr. Lynn Thomas from the University of Washington in Seattle; and Dr. Sara Ritchey from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville to host a symposium on Health, Healing and Caring in Historical Perspective. The researchers received a $19,050 Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Connection Grant to host the event.
The symposium examined a range of topics including health education, reproductive health care, queer health and healing work in allied health professions. Its aim was to fill gaps in current scholarly literature and to bring together new information from a range of established and emerging researchers.
It was held virtually via Zoom May 21-22 and included four separate panels of 20 specialists from India, Israel, Spain, the United States and Canada who spoke on topics related to the labour of healing and caring.
“During the symposium, theoretical connections were made between very disparate topics,” says Krasnick Warsh. “The symposium was unanimously well-received by the participants, who were able to really engage with one another’s work.”
The scholarly papers discussed during the symposium sessions will be published in a special issue of Gender & History, the world’s leading journal on the history of gender relations. The North American office for the academic journal is based at VIU. The special issue Health, Healing and Caring in Historical Perspective will be published in 2021, and the editors intend to host a public reception to celebrate the issue.
The VIU Gender & History editors have also started planning another special issue of the journal on the theme of gender and food in history, to be published in 2022.
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