Gayle Davis

My general research interest is the social history of medicine over the last two centuries. I am particularly fascinated by the uplifting histories of reproductive health and sexuality, madness and psychiatry, and death. In recent years, I have been exploring the interface between reproductive health, clinical practice and the law in post-World War II Britain. I have embarked upon a series of case studies on stillbirth, contraception, infertility, menstruation, and - in particular - abortion. I recently wrote up a sustained research project on the history of abortion with the seriously magnificent Professor Sally Sheldon (University of Bristol Law School). 'The Abortion Act (1967): A Biography' offers a fundamental reevaluation of the 1967 legislation, from the fierce contestation that dogged its formative first two decades through to its current venerable position as one of the oldest extant pieces of statute to govern modern medical practice. My latest project - a welcome opportunity to collaborate with Professor Jonathan Reinarz (Birmingham Medical School) - provides me with a change of scene: how the introduction of medical simulation has transformed British medical education across the long twentieth century. How did these objects - from injecting a humble tangerine and bandaging dolls to working on high-tech manikins - shape student learning, medical knowledge, and patient-practitioner-public relationships?