Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Phase Four: Answers in Nightingale

For the purpose of the final paper I have decided to work with Nightingale's "Notes on Matters" and "Notes on Nursing", suplimented by our Anthology and a few other sources through the Lilly. Throughout the semester I have stuck with Nightingale's texts as I always was left wanting to read more about her findings and the accomplishments and respect she gained during her years as a nurse, this curiosity has also left me with some burning questions which I would like to get to the bottom of-in steps my paper. The primary question I hope to find answers to through the paper is, "What made Nightingale such a force to be reckoned with that Generals and other very important men of the time saught her out and listened to her suggestions?" Women still were not looked on as all that capable at that time, yet these men saught after her advice and took it readily, producing models after her ideas and findings.

In order to investigate this question I hope, through further exaimination of her texts and those secondary texts available I can acquire a good background understanding of where Nightingale came from, why she (of all people) would be asked to overhaul the military hospitals, and get the larger picture of the common medical beliefs of the time through pictures, texts and diagrams.

The main points I hope to address would include a short background of where Nightingale came from, the history of how she came to be a nurse, what accomplishments she made in order to be saught after by military officials, and perhaps delve into what made her do what she did (or find what made her "tick" so to speak).

5 comments:

  1. Hey Lauren! I think this sounds like an awesome idea for a paper! I would definitely be interesting in learning what you discover. This seems like a hard question to answer though, since can you really say for certain why men sought her out? I think it would be useful to see whether you could find some comments that men, such as the Generals you mention, made concerning her influence on the them. However, this may not be the easiest task. Could Killingsworth's "Appeal Through Tropes" help you in making an argument? How does Nightingale construct her audience? What techniques does she employ that enable her to maintain a position of authority? I think your ideas are great but that your thesis may be hard to resolve within your paper.

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  2. Hmm, Laura, you bring up a good point about motivation--how would we reasonably investigate it without falling into generalizing or essentializing assumptions?

    Lauren, for you, what is the dissonance in Nightingale's texts? In other words, what doesn't resolve neatly or cleanly, what doesn't seem to be consistent, and what doesn't act predictable? I haven't had a chance to look at the medical books yet, but I was browsing the catalog list (it's online) and got interested in some of the depictions of surgery. Made me wonder how much of Nightingale's practical suggestions about patient care and hospital management came from certain ideologies and beliefs about medical practice at the time, or whether they were widely divergent from the practices at the time? Is that what you mean by what makes her "tick"?

    -Dr. Graban

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  3. This sounds very interesting and I would like to know more about this topic as well. I would also like to know what challenges she had to overcome to become such a force? and how did she do this? Did she pass on her ideas to a few men who had influence and could speak for her or did she always speak for herself? What put her in this position of respect? Did she come from a family of power and money? Did she marry a highly respected military officer? Or was she just that convincing that she was able to do all this on her own?

    I guess what I'm really wondering is what were her unique circumstances that allowed her to accomplish all she did?

    I hope these questions help some, you sound like you have a very interesting project ahead of you. Good Luck.

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  4. I, too, find it interesting that men valued her opinions at a time when women's ideas were typically disregarded! Maybe a good question to ask, kind of along the lines of what Professor Graban said, would be: Was Nightingale the first to suggest many of her ideas and methods, or was she mainly reinforcing ideas that had already been established by other people? If her ideas were new, they would be bound to spark interest in people, even the men of society! This might help in explaining why she gained such admiration from both women and men.

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  5. I was kind of thinking along the same lines as Alex. I was draw to wonder what it was about her that made her ideas so well know and regarded. How did she portray herself as a woman writer, in a time when women were not highly thought of in normal society, to have her ideas accepted and put into practice?

    I also think that it would be helpful for you to possibly brush up on Ong. The ideas would possibly make it easier for you to write your paper and generate your own audience. Im not sure how much it will help you in untangling Nightingale, but i do think it will help your own writing.

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