"An interesting book for anyone who is interested in the history of
venereal disease. It provides some interesting facts to consider
about women and venereal disease and makes the reader aware that
women have taken a bad rap for many centuries and that bad rap is
slowly being transferred to the gays in this age of AIDS.
Recommended for all academic and medical libraries."
"--AIDS Book Review Journal"
In 1497 the local council of a small town in Scotland issued an
order that all light women--women suspected of prostitution-- be
branded with a hot iron on their face. In late eighteenth- century
England, the body of the prostitute became almost synonymous with
venereal disease as doctors drew up detailed descriptions of the
abnormal and degenerate traits of fallen women. Throughout much of
history, popular and medical knowledge has held women, especially
promiscuous women, as the source of venereal disease. In Feminizing
Venereal Disease, Mary Spongberg provides a critical examination of
this practice by examining the construction of venereal disease in
19th century Britain.
Spongberg argues that despite the efforts of doctors to treat
medicine as a pure science, medical knowledge was greatly
influenced by cultural assumptions and social and moral codes. By
revealing the symbolic importance of the prostitute as the source
of social disease in Victorian England, Spongberg presents a
forceful argument about the gendering of nineteenth- century
medicine. In a fascinating use of history to enlighten contemporary
discourse, the book concludes with a compelling discussion of the
impact of Victorian notions of the body on current discussions of
HIV/AIDS, arguing that AIDS, likesyphilis in the nineteenth
century, has become a feminized disease.
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