Abstract

GONZALEZ GARCIA, Alberto. The Activity of Midwives in the Municipal Charity Institution in Cuenca (Spain) at the beginning of 20th Century from the Gender Perspective. Historelo.rev.hist.reg.local [online]. 2016, vol.8, n.16, pp.230-269. ISSN 2145-132X.  https://doi.org/10.15446/historelo.v8n16.53942.

Midwives are an example of women in health professions who strove for their visibility in a biomedical androcentric universe that has tended to ignore or hide them. The objective of this article is to analyze the incorporation process of midwives in the Municipal Charity institution of Cuenca (Spain) to demonstrate how they were relegated to the background. The methodology includes the analysis of the process by using the gender perspective. The Municipal Archive of Cuenca and the Provincial Archive have been consulted; the main local newspapers of that time were analyzed; and epidemiological data were abstracted from the National Statistics Institute. While physicians and practitioners counted with a specific professional area within the municipality, midwives did not succeed that until 1915. Midwives in Cuenca exercised their functions in a specific place and not in the Casa de Socorro (assistance house), which was of exclusive domain of physicians and practitioners. They also dedicated to private assistance. It is very likely that attendance at childbirth was also carried out by mothers and women neighbors without qualification.

Keywords : midwives; municipal charity institution; androcentrism; Cuenca; Spain.

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