Preserving Nurses’ Cultural History

In honour of the BC History of Nursing Society’s 30th Anniversary, the UBC Nursing History Consortium with UBC-V Nursing and the BC History of Nursing Society welcomed over 70 attendees to the annual (virtual) History Symposium. Kathy Murphy, President of the BCHNS and Geertje Boschma, Professor, UBC School of Nursing, gave the opening remarks and introduced Christina “Tina” Bates, former curator of the Canadian Museum of History in Ottawa.

In her keynote address, Nursing History Embodied: Collecting and Researching a Uniform Collection, Ms. Bates presented selections from the Canadian History Collection focussing on 52 uniforms from nursing schools across Canada. These uniforms and photos of the women who wore them, informed her book, A Cultural History of the Nurse’s Uniform, which shows the role of the uniform in creating nursing identity over 100 years. Below are some quotes from the presentation.

Uniform worn by Edna Muir, 1917-1918

“Visual and artifactual or object evidence can yield just as much, if perhaps different, information about intellectual, social, and cultural milieu as written material.”

“Clothing is the category of material culture that arguably offers the greatest potential for personal identity and values.”

“I see the uniform as having its own power to influence and be used by its wearers, sometimes in compliance with and sometimes in contradiction to its purpose.”

“The uniform was not only a symbol but also an active participant in the formation of personal and social mentalities.”

“As a material culture observer, I ask myself, ‘what am I seeing?’, not ‘what do I want to see?’”

“The visual and tactile dissonance between the ‘don’t touch’ starched bib and apron and the feminized dress underneath can help re-evaluate the sexual role of these young women at the time who wore these uniforms.”