The Greenblatt Library is pleased to host the National Library of Medicine’s traveling exhibition Confronting Violence: Improving Women’s Lives until June 22, 2019. This exhibition tells the story of reformers in social services and nurses who changed the medical profession and dramatically improved services to survivors of domestic violence in the late 20th century. Up until the late 1970s, medicine as a whole largely failed to acknowledge domestic violence as a significant health issue.
Nurses and social workers persistently and passionately convinced the larger medical community to identify victims of battering, respond adequately to their particularly sensitive needs, and work towards the prevention of domestic violence. Drawing on materials in the History of Medicine Division at the National Library of Medicine, this exhibition tells how nurses and their allies reformed medical practice and ultimately improved the lives of millions of women nationwide.
Courtesy National Library of Medicine
The National Library of Medicine produced this exhibition with support from the Office of Research on Women’s Health. The exhibition is free and open to the public. Supplemental online activities and resources for the exhibition are available here.
As a part of the Greenblatt Library’s History of the Health Sciences Lecture Series, a panel discussion regarding violence in women’s lives will be held on Thursday, June 13, 4:30-5:30 p.m. in the Historical Collections and Archives room (AB-2113). The panel will feature Dr. Allison Foley, Dept. of Social Sciences; Dr. Mary Lou Davis, Dept. of Biobehavioral Nursing; and Dr. Melissa Powell-Williams, Dept. of Social Sciences. Dr. Beth NeSmith, College of Nursing, will moderate the discussion. The lecture series is free and open to the public.
