Karolina Widerström

Karolina Olivia Widerström, 1913

Karolina Olivia Widerström , called Lina Widerström (born December 10, 1856 in Hälsingborg , † March 4, 1949 in Stockholm ), was a Swedish gynecologist . She was the first Swedish woman doctor to graduate from university. As a feminist and politician , she campaigned for women's suffrage and sex education .

education

Karolina Widerström was born in Hälsingborg in 1856 as the only daughter of the sports teacher and veterinarian Otto Fredrik Widerström and his wife Olivia Erika Dillén. The family moved to Stockholm in 1873, and at her father's request, she studied at the Gymnastics Institute from 1873 to 1875 to become a physical education teacher. She completed this training in 1875, and in the winter of 1875/76 got a job as an assistant to Professor Lars Gabriel Branting as a physiotherapist, who proposed to her to study medicine in order to become a doctor. She followed this suggestion, completed the Wallinska skolan in Stockholm and then studied at Uppsala University and the Karolinska Institute .

She was the first woman to graduate from the Karolinska Institute in 1884, and four years later, in 1888, she received a licentiate in medicine and became the first woman to be registered as a doctor in Sweden. She specialized in gynecology and gynecology. Since she could not find a job in a hospital as a woman, she opened a gynecological practice in Stockholm a year later, which was very popular. Often the women even waited in the stairwell as the waiting area was always full. She also ran a private clinic from 1893 to 1906, where she operated.

In 1933 she was awarded an honorary doctorate in medicine from the Karolinska Institute.

Sex education

Widerström campaigned for sex education. It was important to her that girls and women should get to know their bodies better, but boys should also take part in these classes. At the same time, she felt it was important for young people to hear about the positive aspects of sexuality. In 1889 she wrote an essay on "The female genitals, their functions and their most common diseases".

After her mother's death in 1909, Widerström moved in with the doctor Maria Aspman , and together they started several projects. They founded a childcare school, wrote school books, and it was on their suggestion that sexual hygiene and health education became part of the elementary school curriculum. As early as 1897 Karolina Widerström gave lectures on sexual hygiene in front of adult women. Participant cards for the lecture were sold privately because they couldn't be advertised in the newspapers. Classes soon expanded to include schools and seminars, and she taught to teachers and school girls. Her lectures covered sexual hygiene, anatomy, reproduction, and how best to protect yourself from disease and pregnancy. It is due to their efforts that in 1907 sex education was taught in almost all girls 'schools in Stockholm and in 1921 this subject was introduced in most of the girls' schools in Sweden. Ten years later it was taught in all schools across the country.

Women's rights

Karolina Widerström also promoted other issues of women's rights. She dedicated herself to the fight against prostitution and pleaded for the social protection of unmarried mothers. She worked with relief efforts for exploited and battered women.

She has been involved in most of the major policy issues related to women's rights and health. She campaigned for equal wages for men and women, for child benefit, maintenance and for the inheritance rights of illegitimate children.

In 1899, Widerström founded the Sällskapet children's hospital, where nurses were trained. She opened a preschool where poor mothers could give their children to go to work. When maternity leave was introduced in the early 1900s and women were banned from working during certain times before and after having a child, she fought for maternity insurance, which was implemented in 1911.

In 1918 she founded the Gynecological Commission (today Kvinnliga Läkares Förening , KLF). In addition, Karolina Widerström was a member of other associations: the Fredrika Bremerförbundet , the Akademiskt Bildade kvinnors förening an association of academically educated women, later renamed Kvinnliga Akademikers Förening KAF, the association of liberal women, later the liberal women's association, and in the national association for women's suffrage . She campaigned for a change in women's clothing, against petticoats and corsets , for reform clothing and pants, which had a better impact on the female skeleton.

death

Karolina Widerström died on March 4, 1949 in Stockholm. Her estate is in the University Library of Gothenburg University .

Fonts

• De qvinnliga royal organs, deras functional and deras vanligaste sjukdomar (1889)
• Den kvinnliga klädedräkten betraktad ur hälsans synpunkt (1893)
• Kvinnohygien, popular framställd. De kvinnliga underlifsorganen, deras förrättningar och vård (1899)
• De veneriska sjukdomarna och deras kämpande (1905)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f} Vem var Karolina Widerström? (No longer available online.) In: huddinge.se. Huddinge kommun, archived from the original on April 22, 2018 ; Retrieved April 21, 2018 (Swedish). Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
2. ↑ ^{a b c} Widerström | Historiska personer - Historiesajten. In: historiesajten.se. Retrieved April 21, 2018 . 
3. ↑ ^{a b c d} Karolina Widerström (1856-1949). In: ki.se. Retrieved April 21, 2018 (Swedish). 
4. ↑ ^{a b} Gynekolog på barrikaderna . In: Popularhistoria.se . 2017 ( popularhistoria.se ).
5. ↑ Sex pioneer: Karolina Widerström | Ottar. In: ottar.se. Retrieved April 21, 2018 (Swedish). 
6. ↑ Karolina Widerström. In: gu.se. www.ub.gu.se, accessed April 21, 2018 (Swedish). 

Web links

Commons : Karolina Widerström  - Collection of images, videos and audio files