Heather Wardlaw
About
PhD Candidate in English and Comparative Literary Studies
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Email: Heather.Wardlaw@warwick.ac.uk
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Supervisors: Prof Liz Barry and Dr Michael Meeuwis
Doctoral Thesis
Care in the Home: Family Nursing and the Medical Profession in the Mid-Nineteenth Century (c. 1830-1860)
My research focuses on depictions of home care provided during the mid-nineteenth century (c. 1830-1860), as healthcare transitioned from a domestic concern to an established set of professions. This project addresses the impact of family-nursing on patient care, how being the family nurse impacted the caregiver, what role family-nurses had in developing modern medical practices and, conversely, the way professionalization of medicine impacted family life. This project brings together literary studies, history of medicine, and critical theories of care to understand, contextualize, and critique illness narratives in the nineteenth century and care tactics of today. Case studies include representations of caregivers and medicine in works from Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Bront毛, Elizabeth Gaskell, and Charlotte Yonge. This project also makes use of non-fiction illness narratives, such as Martineau鈥檚 鈥�Life in the Sick-room鈥� (1844), and medical manuals, such as Todd Thomson鈥檚 鈥�The Domestic Management of the Sick-Room鈥� (1841) and Nightingale鈥檚 鈥�Notes on Nursing鈥� (1859), to better trace the changing views of society regarding who should manage medical care.
Research Interests
Nineteenth century literature, women's writing, feminist literature, medical humanities, ethics of care theory.
Education
MA, English Literary Studies, Durham University
BA, English Literature and Secondary Education, Western Washington University