#72 - A (Brief-ish) History of Western Medicine, Witches, and Women Healers (Solo-Cast)

Jul 15, 2022

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If we aren’t willing to study and learn from history, we are bound to repeat it…As far back as human written history can reflect, women have been in the healing professions. When our cosmologies reflected the dignity of the feminine, women healers may have even ruled the space. When men began to understand their role in procreation, these cosmologies shifted to a patriarchal, masculine worldview, which is intact today.

This shift is cosmologies and growing interest in power by the State, created an environment in which women were progressively devalued. And their magick was trasnsmutated culturally from a source of healing to a source of perceived threat to the Church, State, and the ruling white, upper classes. This solo cast takes you on a journey from Ancient Sumer to our modern industrial complex. Spoiler: things are not going well in our society. As women and healers are devalued, societies decline. This is not speculation; it’s written history.

[00:07:00] - Early creation myths and ancient Sumer, Greece, and Rome

[00:29:00] - Early Christianity and the Dark Ages

[00:37:00] - Hildegard von Bingen

[00:40:00] - The war against nature was a war against the feminine

[00:47:00] - The Witch hunts

[01:02:00] - 18th century and the Renaissance

[01:15:15] - “Regular” doctors and the movement of healing to hospitals

[01:19:15] - The Popular Health Movement

[01:30:00] - Germ theory

[01:35:00] - The birth of the nursing profession and the father of gynecology

[02:02:00] - The AMA and the Flexner Report

[02:13:00] - Current stats on US maternity care and practitioners

References (just a sampling):

Woman as Healer, by Jeanne Achterberg

The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine, by Lindsey Fitzharris

Cesarean Section: An American History of Risk, Technology, and Consequence, by Jacqueline Wolf, PhD

Witches, Midwives, and Nurses: A History of Women Healers, by Barbara Ehrenreich and Deirdre English

https://history-of-obgyn.com/uploads/3/5/4/8/35483599/1966-kobrin-american-midwife-controversy-rev-dec2015.pdf

Find me on Instagram @nathanrileyobgyn and my practice at: www.BelovedHolistics.com

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Music by: Labrinth and Preservation Hall Jazz Band

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