‘Conservative Pioneers’: The Formation of the South African Society of Medical Women

Abstract

This article analyses the professional struggles of the South African Society of Medical Women during the 1950s and 1960s Drawing on interview and archival material, it details their first two campaigns. The first aimed to raise the retirement age of women doctors to bring it in line with their male colleagues, and the second sought to abolish the marriage bar which prevented married women from working in the public service. The research revealed them to have been successful in their endeavours. The article argues that their success was largely due to their conservative gender and racial ideology. The Society sought inclusion into the profession in ways which suited the interests of both men and the state. They widened women's access to the profession without upsetting the gender hierarchies of the medical profession. While their conservative ’gender‘ strategies facilitated their professional inclusion, so too did their race. This article argues that their whiteness ensured that they were the beneficiaries of racial inclusion in a profession structured by racist conventions and divided along racial lines.

women doctors, gendered professionalization, whiteness, medical professionalization, racial closure