Dr. Rufus B. Weaver and his intriguing dissection of Harriet Cole

Nwaogbe, Chidinma; Schmidt, Cameron; Tubbs, R. Shane

doi:10.1016/j.tria.2017.12.002

Cited by 1 publication

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“…The later narrative of her supposed donation then further erased the appropriation of her body not by just ignoring it, but by turning that appropriation into a voluntary act of selfless subjugation to the needs of a white doctor, enhancing his reputation and piquing medical students’ curious gazes. And the story of her ‘donation’ and Weaver’s dissection continues to intrigue anatomists and the public alike ( Nwaogbe, Schmidt, and Tubbs 2018 ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Initially anonymised, deracialised and unsexed, her central nervous system endured for decades before her identity as a working-class African-American woman was reunited with her preserved remains. The story that she gifted her body to an anatomist began to circulate in the 1930s and continues to circulate uncritically in the biomedical literature ( Nwaogbe, Schmidt, and Tubbs 2018 ). While it is very likely a confabulation that erased a history of violence towards both her autonomy and her dead body, the historical context opens the possibility—faint as it may be—that Harriet Cole might have chosen to donate her body to the medical school.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Medical specimens and the erasure of racial violence: the case of Harriet Cole

Lawrence

Lederer

2023

Med Humanities

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This article analyses the complex narrative of Harriet Cole, a 36-year-old African-American woman whose body was delivered to the anatomy department of Hahnemann Medical School in 1888. The anatomist Rufus B Weaver used her preserved remains to create a singular anatomical specimen, an intact extraction of the ‘cerebro-spinal nervous system’. Initially anonymised, deracialised and unsexed, the central nervous system specimen endured for decades before her identity as a working-class woman of colour was reunited with her remains. In the 1930s, media accounts began to circulate that Harriet Cole had bequeathed her remains to the anatomist, a claim that continues to circulate uncritically in the biomedical literature today. Although we conclude that this is likely a confabulation that erased the history of violence to her autonomy and her dead body, the rhetorical possibility that Harriet Cole might have chosen to donate her body to the medical school reflects the racial, political and legal dimensions that influenced how and why the story of Harriet Cole’s ‘gift’ served multiple purposes in the century and a half since her death.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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confidence: 99%