Natalie Stake-Doucet, RN, MSC, Doctoral Candidate, Université de Montréal

The following is an excerpt of a recent post by Natalie Stake-Doucet, on Nursing Clio.

Nursing historiography is centered on whiteness. Even worse, nursing history revolves largely around a single white nurse: Florence Nightingale. This, unfortunately, doesn’t mean nurses understand who Nightingale was. There are nurse historians doing incredible and diverse work, but in general, nursing, both as a profession and as an academic discipline, promotes a view of Nightingale based in a culture of white supremacy rather than historical facts. Here, I make explicit Nightingale’s role in British colonial violence by analyzing some of her writings on the British colonies. This history allows us to better discuss the consequences of her legacy in nursing.

Read more at: https://nursingclio.org/2020/11/05/the-racist-lady-with-the-lamp/