| Architecture in the Family Way: Doctors, Houses, and Women, 1870-1900 Revised Edition Contributor(s): Adams, Annmarie (Author) |
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ISBN: 0773522395 ISBN-13: 9780773522398 Publisher: McGill-Queen's University Press OUR PRICE: $36.05 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: April 2001 Annotation: Winner of the Jason A. Hannah Medal, Architecture in the Family Way explores the relationship between domestic architecture, health reform, and feminism in late nineteenth-century England. Annmarie Adams examines changing perceptions about the English middle-class house from 1870 to 1900, highlighting how attitudes toward health, women, home life, and even politics were played out in architecture. Adams argues that the many significant changes seen in this period were due not to architects' efforts but to the work of feminists and health reformers. Contrary to the widely held belief that the home symbolized a refuge and safe haven to Victorians, Adams reveals that middle-class houses were actually considered poisonous and dangerous and explores the involvement of physicians in exposing "unhealthy" architecture and designing improved domestic environments. She examines the contradictory roles of middle-class women as both regulators of healthy houses and sources of disease and danger within their own homes, particularly during childbirth. Architecture in the Family Way sheds light on an ambiguous period in the histories of architecture, medicine, and women, revealing it to be a time of turmoil, not of progress and reform as is often assumed. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Architecture | Buildings - Residential - Architecture | History - General - Social Science | Women's Studies |
| Dewey: 728.37 |
| Series: McGill-Queen's/Associated Medical Services Studies in History of Medicine, Health, & Society (Paper |
| Physical Information: 0.61" H x 5.99" W x 8.93" (0.85 lbs) 240 pages |
| Themes: - Chronological Period - 1851-1899 - Cultural Region - British Isles - Sex & Gender - Feminine |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: Adams argues that the many significant changes seen in this period were due not to architects' efforts but to the work of feminists and health reformers. Contrary to the widely held belief that the home symbolized a refuge and safe haven to Victorians, Adams reveals that middle-class houses were actually considered poisonous and dangerous and explores the involvement of physicians in exposing "unhealthy" architecture and designing improved domestic environments. She examines the contradictory roles of middle-class women as both regulators of healthy houses and sources of disease and danger within their own homes, particularly during childbirth. |