Chronometer and Steam Engine: Health Guidebooks Raising Gender

Authors

• Anna-Maria Mäki-Kuutti Tampereen yliopisto
• Sinikka Torkkola

Abstract

There is little research on gender in health communication in Finland. Our approach to health and gender is as a cultural and social practice where citizens are positioned in relation to a society, each other and themselves. The article analyses how self-help guidebooks published in different decades participate in the construction of the gender order and the negotiation of the gender contract. We analysed the prefaces and tables of the content of 22 popular self-help books on health aimed at men and women in 1893–1981. The majority of the books are aimed at women because health is regarded as one of their ‘natural’ responsibilities. In the books, the gendering of health and illness concerns all aspects of health: women and men are ill and look after their health differently. This is manifest in the health information the guidebooks contain, the ways the books address male and female readers and in the tips the audience is given on the proper use of the body. The self-help books on health call women and men to the health discipline and position them in their rightful places in the cultural and social order. The order of the genders persists but it is reproduced in different ways at different times.