Open lecture 17 February: Dust and bacilli horror of the past and present

11 February 2020

Welcome to an open lecture at the library with Agnes Wold, Professor of clinical bacterology at Gothenburg University, and chief physician at Sahlgrenska University Hospital.

Dust and bacilli horror of the past and present

Hygiene was the great fashion science around the turn of the last century. Hygiene means all measures that provide health, and included both racial hygiene, housing hygiene and what we now think most about - cleaning and dusting and keeping clean. This cleaning got a boost when the new fashion science - microbiology - saw the light of day towards the end of the 19th century. It was thought that the bacteria housed in the dust and the role of the housewife was to fight the dust to save the family's health.

Since then, the innocent dust has become the projection surface for our fear of illness and death. And the women have been shackled by the dustpan and the vacuum cleaner, right into our time.

Welcome to an open lecture with Agnes Wold, at KvinnSam, National Resource Library for Gender Studies together with Kvinnliga Akademikers Förening.

Lecturer: Agnes Wold, Professor of clinical bacterology at Gothenburg University, and chief physician at Sahlgrenska University Hospital.

The lecture will be held in Swedish.