Against the Odds New Zealand's first women doctors

by Selway, Michaela; Farquhar, Cynthia

• ISBN13: 9781991016980
• ISBN10: 1991016980
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2025-10-01
• Publisher: Massey University Press

Summary

In 2025, the year Otago Medical School celebrates 150 years, 50 per cent of graduates are women. Back in 1891, by contrast, when Emily Siedeberg, who would go on to become the school’ s first woman graduate, applied for entrance it was not at all clear that it would be granted. This book traces the paths of the women who, between the 1890s and 1967, battled indifference and chauvinism — and later many of the other challenges that faced women in the professions — to become New Zealand’ s first women doctors.

Table of Contents

FOREWORDS 6 PREFACE 8 INTRODUCTION 13 1. THE PIONEERS 1891– 1913 31 2. THE WAR YEARS 1914– 1919 67 3. THE INTERWAR YEARS 1920– 1938 99 4. THE ‘ PRIVILEGE OF BEING STUDENTS’ 1939– 1948 131 5. REFUGEES OF WAR 1941– 1967 157 6. AGENTS OF CHANGE 1948– 1967 189 7. MAKING THEIR MARK IN RESEARCH 1896– 1967 237 CONCLUSION 271 GRADUATES AND THEIR QUALIFICATIONS 283 NOTES 295 BIBLIOGRAPHY 317 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 329 ABOUT THE AUTHORS 331 INDEX 332