Associate Professor Alison Downham Moore

Position

Associate Dean of Research, School of Humanities and Communication Arts; Associate Professor of History & Medical Humanities

Biography

A/Prof Downham Moore is a medical humanities scholar and historian of modern European and of global medical history. She has published widely on the history of French and German psychiatry and medicine, on the long history of sexuality, gender, ageing and medicine. She has also written about historical theory, genocide historiographic debates, and the history of European medical ideas about digestion and diet. She has studied non-award biomedical sciences at the University of New England, to enrich her expertise in histories of biology, health, nutrition and disease.

She currently holds an Australian Research Council Discovery Grant: DP190101457 on Sexual Ageing in the History of Medicine.

She is author of The French Invention of Menopause and the Medicalisation of Women's Ageing: A History (contracted to Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2022),and is now completing another individual research monograph entitled Gendered Ageing in the History of Biomedicine.

She is involved in collaborative projects on the history of digestive health, on the history of health foods, on the historical writing of Michel Foucault, and on the history and current practice of gynaecological surgeries worldwide and in diverse patient groups.

Alison is a university and SoHCA research mentor and is happy to provide research, teaching or career mentoring support to emergent scholars in any humanities and social science discipline.

She welcomes prospective honours, masters and PhD projects in any area of European cultural or intellectual history, any area of historiography or historical theory, any area of sexuality or gender studies, and any area of history of medicine, science, sport or health across time and place.

She welcomes meaningful research collaboration with scholars of any level of experience, from any scholarly discipline, and from all parts of the world. Corresponding scholars are welcome to write to her in English, French or German.

Some of her recent podcast interviews, video abstracts and video/audio recordings of talks include:

• Extended video abstract for "Foucault’s 1960s Lectures on Sexuality", (opens in a new window) co-authored with Stuart Elden, Theory, Culture and Society.
• George Rude Seminar and French Historical Studies combined online conference July 2020: "French Doctors and the Intercultural Discovery of Women’s Longevity" (opens in a new window)
• Ancestral Health Symposium Talk, (opens in a new window) August 2019 on the history and science of menopausal hormone replacement therapies

Research Interests

• History of medicine
• Medical and health humanities
• History and current practices of gynaecology, reproductive and sexual medicine
• History of digestive health
• Women’s and Transgender peoples’ health matters in multi-disciplinary collaborative research

Committees

• School Research and Higher Degree committee
• Research Convenor for the History Group
• School Disability Support Committee
• University Mentoring Scheme
• School of Humanities and Communication Arts Mentor

Memberships

• Australian Association of Gerontology (2019 - 2020)
• New York Association of European Historians (2020 - 2021)
• Hanse Wissenschaftskolleg Alumni Fellow (2020 - 2025)
• Australasian Health and Medical Humanities Network (2021 - 2026)
• Australian Historical Association (2021 - 2026)
• Australian Women's History Network (2021 - 2023)

Awards and Recognition

• University Medal and Philip Erdos Prize for Best History Honours Thesis, University of Sydney 1995-02-01
• Visiting Scholar grant from the Society for the Study of French History 2017-03-15
• Grant-in-Aid from the Foundation for the Scientific Study of Sexuality for travel relating to research on gay SM subcultures in the U.S. 2002-09-01
• Australian Research Council Discovery Grant DP 190101457 2019-01-02
• Hanse Wissenschaftskolleg Research Fellowship 2019-01-02
• Humanities and Communication Arts (WSU) Researcher of the Year (traditional) 2019-06-01
• Humanities and Communication Arts (WSU) Research Collaboration Funding: Gut Feeling and Digestive Health in Nineteenth-Century Literature, History and Culture 2018-06-01
• Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (UTS) Research Development Grant: The Forgotten History of Cultural Historiography 2009-06-01
• Early Career Researcher Development Grant, UQ (unable to be accepted due to change of post) 2008-05-01
• Australian Academy of the Humanities Travel Grant: Sadism, Masochism and Gender Identification in France, 1890-1925 2006-07-01
• Foundation for the Scientific Study of Sexuality (USA): Granti-in-aid: Gay SM Subcultures in the U.S. 2002-07-01
• Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies Marie Curie Senior Fellowship 2020-01-01
• Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies, Alumni Fellowship 2021: Global Entanglements in the History of Gynaecology 2021-01-06
• Advance HE Senior Fellowship in teaching leadership and mentoring
• Elected Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (UK)

Qualifications

• PhD in History (University of Sydney)
• Bachelor of Arts Honours, Class 1, University medal (University of Sydney)

Research & Publications

• Most of A/Prof Downham Moore's publications can be freely downloaded from her Academia.edu profile (opens in a new window)

Contact Details