SSHA Annual Conference 2022

Kateřina Lišková, Natalia Jarska, Annina E.E. Gagyiova, and José L.A. López Barajas presented at the conference SSHA Annual Conference which took place from 17th to 20th November 2022 in Chicago.

Kateřina Lišková chaired the panel and presented the broader context for ExpertTurn research and outlined its aims and objectives. She focused on the social science methodology the team applies when conducting research.

The paper Natalia Jarksa presented discussed premarital medical examination in three countries: Czechoslovakia, Poland and Soviet Occupation Zone/East Germany in the early post-war period. While approaches to premarital certificates differed, in all countries this eugenic measure was seriously discussed in the immediate post-war years, but the idea was dropped by the 1950s, due to ideological and political changes, as well as transnational exchange (between Poland and Czechoslovakia).

Annina Gagyiova talked about medical experts in 1950s socialist Hungary and their fight against infant mortality by stressing the importance of breastfeeding. In her paper, she explored conflicting realities of women who were both mothers and workers and how experts provided solutions for ensuring sufficient breastmilk supply.

José L.A. López Barajas presented a paper on pregnancy counseling in East-Central Europe. The question of where to give birth -either at home or in a hospital- became nuclear in postwar times. While Polish and Czechoslovak experts preferred hospitals, Hungarian and East Germans argued that both ways were compatible. Though, by the end of the 1950s, the transition to hospital birth was achieved in the four countries.