NIH Record - National Institutes of Health

‘dissecting gender’

Artist Hill-Edgar To Deliver 5th DeBakey Lecture, June 3

Hill-Edgar stands in front of artwork mounted on wall and behind a table with paintbrushes in foreground
Dr. Allison Hill-Edgar

Photo:  Allison Hill-Edgar

Dr. Allison Hill-Edgar, a 2020 NLM Michael E. DeBakey fellow in the history of medicine, artist and independent scholar, will give the 5th annual Michael E. DeBakey Lecture in the History of Medicine online on Thursday, June 3 from 2 to 3:30 p.m. ET. Her talk, “Dissecting Gender: Reframing Anatomical History Through the Female Body,” will be live-streamed and archived by NIH VideoCasting.

The female body has been a part of anatomical history from its inception, but usually as the reproductive other to the male body. Hill-Edgar’s presentation re-examines the Western anatomical tradition through the lens of the female body in order to elucidate factors that have framed our understanding of and approach to gender differences in medicine and society. 

Drawing primarily on images and sources held by the NLM History of Medicine Division, she will share an array of often marginalized anatomical works, and highlight many of the related subjects, patients, medical practitioners, anatomists, artists and activists. This archival analysis reveals the impact of anatomical visual history on current culture and medical practice today.

Hill-Edgar, a visual artist working in New York City and affiliated with New York Academy of Art, and the Fenimore Art Museum, Cooperstown, N.Y., graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College in 1994, where she majored in fine arts. She also has studied the human body from a scientific perspective, earning her M.D. from Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons in 2003, completing her medical internship at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital and obtaining her medical license in 2004.

NLM DeBakey Fellowship Now Accepting Applications for 2022

Tinted photo of masked and gowned Debakey with his gloved hands poised over an unseen patient
In an image from NLM’s online collection, Dr. Michael E. DeBakey performs surgery, circa 1981.

The National Library of Medicine has announced that the application period is open for its Michael E. DeBakey Fellowship in the History of Medicine. The fellowship provides up to $10,000 to support onsite research in the historical collections of NLM, which span 10 centuries, encompass a variety of digital and physical formats, and originate from nearly every part of the globe. 

Collections include the DeBakey papers—representing the diverse areas in which DeBakey made a lasting impact, such as surgery, medical education and health care policy—along with the papers of many other luminaries in science and medicine.

Anyone over age 18, of any academic discipline and status, who has not previously received this fellowship may apply. Non-U.S. citizens may apply. Group applications should be submitted under the name of a single principal researcher.

For details about the application process and required documents, visit the websites at https://www.nlm.nih.gov/hmd/get-involved/debakey-fellowship.html and https://faes.org/DeBakey-Fellowship.

To apply for the fellowship, submit all required materials to the Foundation for Advanced Education in the Sciences (FAES) via the online application portal, by midnight EDT, Sept. 30, 2021. Selected fellows will be notified and awards will be announced in December.

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