Barbara Bates Seminar Series 4.1.25

“Do I need to take a security guard to the gynecologist?” Sexual Misconduct and the Crisis in Reproductive Health Care in the U.S.

Speaker: Wendy Kline, PhD, Purdue University 

Date + Time: Tuesday, April 1, 2025, 4:00pm - 5:00pm, EDT 

Location: Hybrid; Gershwind & Bennett Family Collaborative Classroom, Holman Biotech Commons, 3610 Hamilton Walk, University of Pennsylvania + Zoom webinar 

Register for the Seminar

Beginning in 1960, a trip to the gynecologist was nearly synonymous with getting the birth control pill – or at least the main reason many visited the gynecologist in the U.S. But by the 1990s, it was becoming clearer that more and more sexually active women were putting off a trip to the gynecologist due to the shame and fear of getting a pelvic exam. But why has the pelvic exam become a source of shame and fear? The exposure of sexual misconduct in the examining room has eroded the sense of trust between patients and gynecologists, resulting in a massive decline in preventive reproductive health care. In this talk, Kline argues that the real problem has to do with the unaddressed, indeed silenced, stigma surrounding the practice of the routine gynecological exam. It has to do with the very uncomfortable question of what it means to touch and peer into the vagina of a patient. And it’s a problem that’s been with us since the origins of gynecology. 

Wendy Kline, Ph.D., Dema G. Seelye Chair in the History of Medicine at Purdue University, is internationally recognized for her scholarship in the history of medicine, history of women’s health and the history of childbirth. She is the author of four major books focusing on sexuality and reproduction: Exposed: The Hidden History of the Pelvic Exam (Polity Press, 2024); Coming Home: How Midwives Changed Birth (Oxford University Press, 2019); Bodies of Knowledge: Sexuality, Reproduction, and Women’s Health in the Second Wave (U. of Chicago Press 2010); and Building a Better Race: Gender, Sexuality, and Eugenics from the Turn of the Century to the Baby Boom (U. of California Press, 2001). She has appeared in the Netflix documentary, Sex, Explained, as well as the PBS documentary, The Eugenics Crusade. Her research has been funded by major fellowships, including a Fulbright Distinguished Scholar fellowship, a British Academy Fellowship, and a Huntington Fellowship. Kline is also a professional violinist, currently principal second with the Lafayette Symphony Orchestra.

This seminar is co-sponsored by Penn Nursing’s Center for Global Women’s Health. 
Any questions please contact Elisa Stroh at [email protected] or (215) 898-4502.