Books by Caroline Rusterholz
Il suffit d’une vingtaine d’années pour que les sociétés occidentales passent du baby boom au b... more Il suffit d’une vingtaine d’années pour que les sociétés occidentales passent du baby boom au baby bust. Le nombre d’enfants par famille augmente fortement dès la Seconde Guerre mondiale puis s’effondre à partir du milieu des années 1960 pour se stabiliser à une moyenne de 1,5 enfant au tournant des années 1970.
Quelles sont les raisons de cette transformation rapide et profonde de l’intimité familiale?
Cet ouvrage cherche à éclairer cette révolution silencieuse au travers du cas de la Suisse romande pour les années 1955-1970. Il donne la parole à une cinquantaine d’individus devenus parents dans les villes de Lausanne et de Fribourg durant les années 1960. Accès à la contraception, discours médiatiques, religieux et politiques sur la famille et l’éducation: les deux villes offrent alors un environnement bien différents aux jeunes parents. Ce contraste met en lumière l’importance du contexte social et institutionnel sur les choix intimes.
Combinant sources institutionnelles, médiatiques et expériences individuelles, cet ouvrage éclaire les aspirations familiales et professionnelles d’une génération précurseuse de nos sociétés contemporaines. Le bien-être matériel et émotionnel de l’enfant et des parents devient un élément déterminant, renforçant l’idée de l’enfant précieux.
Papers by Caroline Rusterholz
![Research paper thumbnail of “If we can show that we are helping adolescents to understand themselves, their feelings and their needs, then we are doing [a] valuable job”: counselling young people on sexual health in the Brook Advisory Centre (1965–1985)](https://attachments.academia-assets.com/95281084/thumbnails/1.jpg)
Medical Humanities, 2021
First opened in 1964 in London, the Brook Advisory Centres (BAC) were the first centres to provid... more First opened in 1964 in London, the Brook Advisory Centres (BAC) were the first centres to provide contraceptive advice and sexual counselling to unmarried people in postwar Britain. Drawing on archival materials, medical articles published by BAC members and oral history interviews with former counsellors, this paper looks at tensions present in sexual health counselling work between progressive views on young people’s sexuality and moral conservatism. In so doing, this paper makes two inter-related arguments. First, I argue that BAC doctors, counsellors and social workers simultaneously tried to adopt a non-judgmental listening approach to young people’s sexual needs and encouraged a model of heteronormative sexual behaviours that was class-based and racialised. Second, I argue that emotional labour was central in BAC staff’s attempt to navigate and smooth these tensions. This emotional labour and the tensions within it is best illustrated by BAC’s pyschosexual counselling service...
The series covers the circumstances that promote health or illness, the ways in which people expe... more The series covers the circumstances that promote health or illness, the ways in which people experience and explain such conditions, and what, practically, they do about them. Practitioners of all approaches to health and healing come within its scope, as do their ideas, beliefs, and practices, and the social, economic and cultural contexts in which they operate. Methodologically, the series welcomes relevant studies in social, economic, cultural, and intellectual history, as well as approaches derived from other disciplines in the arts, sciences, social sciences and humanities. The series is a collaboration between Manchester University Press and the Society for the Social History of Medicine.
Youth Sexuality, Responsibility and the Opening of the Brook Advisory Centre in London and Birmingham in the 1960s
This article takes the opening of the Brook Advisory Centres (BAC) in London (1964) and Birmingha... more This article takes the opening of the Brook Advisory Centres (BAC) in London (1964) and Birmingham (1966) as a comparative case study for exploring the public debate on youth sexuality. BAC were the first centres in postwar Britain specifically dedicated to the provision of advice on birth control and emotional problems to unmarried and young people. By focusing on an initiative that launched amidst rising concerns over illegitimacy and promiscuity, this article engages with the debate over social change in the 1960s and the 'permissive society'. It argues that the notion of responsibility became a key paradigm for supporters of a new sexual culture in the debate about youth and contraception in the 1960s. Combining archival material, media analysis and oral history interviews, this article shows that in constructing the need for a service for unmarried people, BAC faced being accused of encouraging promiscuity. This resulted in the production of a narrative that stressed th...
Saisir l'adolescence à travers la microéconomie familiale (1925-1970)
Youth Sexuality, Responsibility, and the Opening of the Brook Advisory Centres in London and Birmingham in the 1960s
Journal of British Studies, 2022
This article takes the opening of the Brook Advisory Centres in London (1964) and Birmingham (196... more This article takes the opening of the Brook Advisory Centres in London (1964) and Birmingham (1966) as a comparative case study for exploring the public debate on youth sexuality. The two centers were the first in postwar Britain specifically dedicated to the provision of advice on birth control and emotional problems to unmarried and young people. By focusing on an initiative that launched amid rising concerns over illegitimacy and promiscuity, the article engages with the debate over social change in the 1960s and the so-called permissive society. The author argues that the notion of responsibility became a key paradigm for supporters of a new sexual culture. Combining archival material, media analysis, and oral history interviews, the author shows that in constructing the need for a service for unmarried people, the Brook Advisory Centres faced accusations of encouraging promiscuity. Their main line of defense was the production of a narrative that stressed the notion of responsi...
Giving birth control medical credentials in Britain: 1920-70 [W]omen clients came to us because w... more Giving birth control medical credentials in Britain: 1920-70 [W]omen clients came to us because we were all women. Women doctors, women nurses, women running clinics. 1 Helena Wright From the opening of birth control clinics in the early 1920s to the Family Planning Act in 1967, women have been central actors in the campaign for birth control and contraception in Britain. 2 Female doctors, in particular, played a unique role in the practicalities of birth control. They introduced birth control as a field of medical research and practice because they wanted to give their female patients power over their reproductive bodies and because birth control clinics provided them with job opportunities. Indeed, women were disproportionately represented among doctors interested in birth control, and they dominated this field due to their active participation in birth control clinics, the development of training in contraception and the production of medical and scientific knowledge on birth control and contraception. In a nutshell, they colonised birth control and contraception. This chapter sheds new light on some well-known aspects of the history of birth control and the Family Planning Association, with a focus on the medicalisation process and the initiatives and strategies women doctors used to position themselves as respectable experts in the new field. They developed a specific form of communication with colleagues that relied heavily on specialised medical vocabulary; this discourse was aimed at improving their status and securing new job opportunities within the medical field. When addressing lay audiences, women doctors conveyed a narrative that emphasised the benefits of birth control for society and the family. They made birth control a medical service by offering a detailed description of contraceptives
Testing IUDs: a transnational journey of expertise Failures do not occur Douglas. There is not a ... more Testing IUDs: a transnational journey of expertise Failures do not occur Douglas. There is not a single case on record of a woman fitted with the Gräfenberg ring becoming pregnant. 1 Ethel Mannin, 1930s The excerpt above is reproduced from the correspondence between Ethel Mannin and Douglas Goldring-two literary figures of the interwar years. Ethel Mannin, a British novelist, recommended the Gräfenberg ring, an early version of what later became known as an intrauterine device (IUD), to her friend Douglas Goldring as an effective method of contraception for his wife, Malin Goldring. 2 Mannin had been fitted by Norman Haire, a Jewish-Australian gynaecologist and sexologist and a well-known, if eccentric, figure within London's elite medical community; he had an exclusive, private clinical practice on Harley Street. Norman Haire was not alone in experimenting with the ring. The female gynaecologist Helena Wright, with the backup of the Birth Control Investigation Committee (BCIC), was testing the ring in her private practice, while Dr Margaret Jackson also fitted her patients with the device in her private practice in Devonshire up until the 1960s, at which point she started testing other new intrauterine devices as well. The last chapter of this book takes the testing of the Gräfenberg ring and later forms of intrauterine devices as a case study through which to explore the crucial contributions of Helena Wright and Margaret Jackson to the assessment of new contraceptive technologies, from a transnational perspective. Despite its short-lived use in the 1930s, the success of the ring constituted evidence that new contraceptive technologies were much needed. As I have shown in Chapter 1, female
Sexual disorders and infertility: expanding the work of the clinics Oh this isn't so boring if yo... more Sexual disorders and infertility: expanding the work of the clinics Oh this isn't so boring if you get your climax.
You Can't Dismiss that as Being Less Happy, You See it is Different'. Sexual Counselling in 1950s England
20 century British history, 2019
This article uses the audio recordings of sexual counselling sessions carried out by Dr Joan Mall... more This article uses the audio recordings of sexual counselling sessions carried out by Dr Joan Malleson, a birth control activist and committed family planning doctor in the early 1950s, which are held at the Wellcome Library in London as a case study to explore the ways Malleson and the patients mobilised emotions for respectively managing sexual problems and expressing what they understood as constituting a 'good sexuality' in postwar Britain. The article contains two interrelated arguments. First, it argues that Malleson used a psychological framework to inform her clinical work. She resorted to an emotion-based therapy that linked sexual difficulties with unconscious, repressed feelings rooted in past events. In so doing, Malleson actively helped to produce a new form of sexual subjectivity where individuals were encouraged to express their feelings and emotions, breaking with the traditional culture of emotional control and restraint that characterized British society up ...
Religion and Contraception in Comparative Perspective—Switzerland, 1950–1970
This chapter analyses the changes in the position of the Catholic authorities on birth control an... more This chapter analyses the changes in the position of the Catholic authorities on birth control and the laity’s initiatives to spread information on this issue before and after the publication of Humanae Vitae in two neighbouring cantons of French-speaking Switzerland belonging to the same diocese, Catholic Fribourg and Protestant Vaud. By exploiting pastoral letters, bishops’ discourses, parish journals, and laity letters sent to Bishop Monsignor Charriere, the differences resulting from demographics and the interdenominational context in the framing and formulation of dissent are illuminated. Even within the same national and linguistic context, the Fribourg Catholic clergy and laity were less vocal in their opposition to the encyclical than their Lausanne counterparts in a Protestant canton.
Donna J. Drucker, Contraception, A Concise History
European Journal for the History of Medicine and Health, 2021
David Geiringer, The Pope and the Pill, Sex, Catholicism and Women in Post-War England, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2020, pp. XII + 213, £80.00, ISBN: 9781526138385
British Catholic History, 2020
In the last decade, ego-documents, oral history interviews, and the Mass Observation Archive have... more In the last decade, ego-documents, oral history interviews, and the Mass Observation Archive have increasingly been used to trace changes in intimacy and authenticity in twentieth-century Britain and Europe.1 Similarly, demographic historians have used oral histories to better understand the ways religion impacted reproductive behaviours.2 Research by Diane Gervais and Danielle Gauvreau has shown the emotional struggles Catholic women underwent when trying to comply with the Catholic position on contraception in Quebec.3 The fiftieth anniversary of Humanae Vitae, the Catholic Encyclical that condemned the use of artificial methods of birth control, has further renewed interest in religion and sexuality.4 Despite this research, very little is known of the ways self-identified Catholic women lived their sexual lives in post-war Britain. David Geiringer’s book fills this gap. His clear prose challenges the ‘tale of sex destroying religion’ (p. 3) by closely exploring the discursive, material, and embodied sexual experiences of Catholic women. Based on 27 interviews with self-identified Catholic women, Geiringer takes women’s narratives seriously by recognising women’s agency in their daily life, and explores the relationship between religion and sexuality. Geiringer’s commitment to privileging the voices and experiences of Catholic women is reflected in the methodology and structure of the book. The life-cycle, divided in three key stages in reverse chronology, namely sexuality in later marriage, sexuality in early marriage, and early life and premarital sex, provide the core structure of his
The History of the Family, 2018
Two children to make ends meet': the ideal family size, parental responsibilities and costs of ch... more Two children to make ends meet': the ideal family size, parental responsibilities and costs of children on two sides of the Iron Curtain during the postwar fertility decline
Medical History, 2019
This paper explores the influence of English female doctors on the creation of the International ... more This paper explores the influence of English female doctors on the creation of the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) and the production and circulation of contraceptive knowledge in England and, to a lesser extent in France, between 1930 and 1970. By drawing on the writings of female doctors and proceedings of international conferences as well as the archives of the British Medical Women’s Federation (MWF) and Family Planning Association (FPA), on the one hand, andMouvement Français pour le Planning Familial(MFPF), on the other, this paper explores the agency of English female doctors at the national and transnational level. I recover their pioneering work and argue that they were pivotal in legitimising family planning within medical circles. I then turn to their influence on French doctors after World War II. Not only were English medical women active and experienced agents in the family planning movement in England; they also represented a conduit of information ...
Medical History, 2019
This special issue adopts a comparative approach to the politics of reproduction in twentieth-cen... more This special issue adopts a comparative approach to the politics of reproduction in twentieth-century France and Britain. The articles investigate the flow of information, practices and tools across national boundaries and between groups of experts, activists and laypeople. Empirically grounded in medical, news media and feminist sources, as well as ethnographic fieldwork, they reveal the practical similarities that existed between countries with officially different political regimes as well as local differences within the two countries. Taken as a whole, the special issue shows that the border between France and Britain was more porous than is typically apparent from nationally-focused studies: ideas, people and devices travelled in both directions; communication strategies were always able to evade the rule of law; contraceptive practices were surprisingly similar in both countries; and religion loomed large in debates on both sides of the channel.
Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, 2017
This paper examines the introduction to Britain of the Gr€ afenberg ring, an early version of wha... more This paper examines the introduction to Britain of the Gr€ afenberg ring, an early version of what later became known as an intrauterine device (IUD). The struggle during the interwar years to establish the value of the ring provides an opportunity for a case study of the evaluation and acceptance of a new medical device. With the professionalization of the birth control movement and the expansion of birth control clinics in interwar Britain, efforts to develop better scientific means for contraception grew rapidly. At the end of the nineteenth century, methods for controlling fertility ranged from coitus interruptus and abstinence, to diverse substances ingested or placed into the vagina, to barrier methods. The first decades of the twentieth century brought early work on chemical contraceptives as well as a number of new intrauterine devices, among them the Gr€ afenberg ring. Developing a cheap, reliable, and widely acceptable contraceptive became a pressing goal for activists in the voluntary birth control movement in Britain between the wars. Yet, tensions developed over the best form of contraception to prescribe. By situating the Gr€ afenberg ring within the context of the debates and competition among British medical and birth control professionals, this paper reveals broader issues of power relationships and expertise in the assessment of a new medical technology.
English and French Women Doctors in International Debates on birth control (1920–1935)
Social History of Medicine, 2017
This paper focuses on the roles played by English and French women doctors in international debat... more This paper focuses on the roles played by English and French women doctors in international debates about birth control (1920-1935). It highlights the concrete impact of different national policies relating to family and reproductive health on women doctors’ stances on birth control. It shows the significant role of English medical women in the practical aspects of birth control and the reluctance of French female doctors to engage with issues revolving around reproduction. It argues that English women doctors were among the leaders in the process of medicalisation of birth control at international conferences due to their practical experience and expertise in birth control acquired at the national level.
Une transition au féminin ? Modèles de parentalité et fécondité en Suisse (1955-1970)
Genre, sexualité et société, 2016
Cet article aborde la question du role des femmes dans les transformations des comportements sexu... more Cet article aborde la question du role des femmes dans les transformations des comportements sexuels et familiaux en Suisse entre 1955-1970. Cette etude comparative portant sur les villes de Lausanne et Fribourg adopte le point de vue des individus en y integrant une perspective de genre. Basee sur des entretiens en histoire orale avec des personnes qui etaient parents et mariees a Fribourg et Lausanne durant la periode etudiee, cette recherche se concentre sur deux aspects particuliers touchant au role des femmes dans la formation familiale, reinterrogeant des suppositions ou des presupposes de la recherche. D’abord, a l’oppose de l’idee d’une emancipation des modeles traditionnels, le modele de la mere au foyer est plus pregnant que jamais dans cette periode. Pour autant, cela n’empeche nullement les femmes d’etre proactives dans le domaine de la contraception. Ainsi, ce n’est pas par volonte d’emancipation que les femmes elargissent leur domaine de competence a la sexualite, mais plutot, paradoxalement, par leur adhesion au modele traditionnel de la mere au foyer disponible et competente pour ses enfants.
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Books by Caroline Rusterholz
Quelles sont les raisons de cette transformation rapide et profonde de l’intimité familiale?
Cet ouvrage cherche à éclairer cette révolution silencieuse au travers du cas de la Suisse romande pour les années 1955-1970. Il donne la parole à une cinquantaine d’individus devenus parents dans les villes de Lausanne et de Fribourg durant les années 1960. Accès à la contraception, discours médiatiques, religieux et politiques sur la famille et l’éducation: les deux villes offrent alors un environnement bien différents aux jeunes parents. Ce contraste met en lumière l’importance du contexte social et institutionnel sur les choix intimes.
Combinant sources institutionnelles, médiatiques et expériences individuelles, cet ouvrage éclaire les aspirations familiales et professionnelles d’une génération précurseuse de nos sociétés contemporaines. Le bien-être matériel et émotionnel de l’enfant et des parents devient un élément déterminant, renforçant l’idée de l’enfant précieux.
Papers by Caroline Rusterholz
Quelles sont les raisons de cette transformation rapide et profonde de l’intimité familiale?
Cet ouvrage cherche à éclairer cette révolution silencieuse au travers du cas de la Suisse romande pour les années 1955-1970. Il donne la parole à une cinquantaine d’individus devenus parents dans les villes de Lausanne et de Fribourg durant les années 1960. Accès à la contraception, discours médiatiques, religieux et politiques sur la famille et l’éducation: les deux villes offrent alors un environnement bien différents aux jeunes parents. Ce contraste met en lumière l’importance du contexte social et institutionnel sur les choix intimes.
Combinant sources institutionnelles, médiatiques et expériences individuelles, cet ouvrage éclaire les aspirations familiales et professionnelles d’une génération précurseuse de nos sociétés contemporaines. Le bien-être matériel et émotionnel de l’enfant et des parents devient un élément déterminant, renforçant l’idée de l’enfant précieux.