MEDICAL PRESCRIPTIONS FOR WOMEN'S SOCIAL LIFE
MARRIAGE AS A HYGIENIC MEASURE (19TH CENTURY)
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17564/2316-3828.2022v11n2p69-81Published
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This article addresses medical-hygienic prescriptions for the daily life of women, using as main sources medical theses defended at the Bahia's School of Medicine, in the 19th century, located in the Gonçalo Moniz Library, Bahia's School of Medicine (Faculdade de Medicina da Bahia), in Salvador/BA. It is recurrent in the issues addressed in the analyzed medical theses the discourse around women education, with several themes that focus on hygiene rules for the body and prescriptions regarding the behavior to be followed by women in the domestic and public spaces. Among these prescriptions, the doctors pointed to marriage as a prophylactic measure for the ills of women's health and indicated the ideal age for girls, young ladies, and women to get married. Medicine constructed a discourse on women education, considering marriage as a preventive/curative measure for women in order to avoid certain illnesses. The medical-hygienic discourses around hygienic prescriptions for women's marriage stemmed from the influence of Catholic morality and the dominance of patriarchy and resulted in violence and male domination, with negative repercussions that can be evidenced in the present time.