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Contact Info: Department of History Tufts University East Hall, room 107 Medford, MA 02155 617.627.4131 Email Prof. Rankin Office Hours: On leave Download CV

Biography

I joined the Tufts history department in January 2008. Despite being new to Tufts, I am no stranger to the Boston area: I received my Ph.D. from Harvard University in 2005 and my B.A. from Wellesley College in 1996. My most recent position was a post-doctoral Junior Research Fellowship at Trinity College, University of Cambridge. As much as I enjoyed England, it is a pleasure to be back in Massachusetts.

My broad research interests are early modern European history (c. 1450-1750), the history of science and medicine, and women's history. My dissertation examined noblewomen-healers in sixteenth-century Germany, who became widely known and admired for their medical knowledge. It is currently in the final stages as a book manuscript titled Panacea's Daughters: Gentlewomen and the Art of Healing in Early Modern Germany. I am co-editing a collection of essays titled Secrets and Knowledge in Medicine and Science, 1500-1800, which will be published by Ashgate Press in 2010. In addition, I am starting a new book project on wonder drugs and panaceas in early modern Europe, which will examine the popularity of cure-alls in both learned medicine and popular culture from the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries.

My courses cover my range of research interests. I have developed courses on women, gender, and family, 1200-1800, the history of medicine in medieval and early modern Europe, the history of science, and the body and sexuality. In the future, I will also be teaching Renaissance and Reformation Europe, as well as a course on the history of public health.

Expertise

Early Modern Europe, the History of Science and Medicine, Women's History, the History of the Body and Sexuality

Fellowships

• Junior Research Fellowship in History, Trinity College, Cambridge, 2004-8
• Dissertation Finishing Grant, Harvard University Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, 2004-5
• Dissertation Research Fellowship, American Institute of the History of Pharmacy, 2003-4
• Mellon Fellowship for Dissertation Research in Original Sources, 2002-3
• Wellesley College Eugene Cox Fellowship for Dissertation Research, 2002-3
• Fulbright Fellowship for the Study of History in Germany, 1996-7

Awards

• Shryock Medal, American Association for the History of Medicine, 2005
• Bok Center Certificate of Distinction in Teaching, Harvard University, 2002

Major Publications

• "The Housewife's Apothecary in Hohberg's Georgica Curiosa," Medicina & Storia (forthcoming 2008).
• "Duchess, Heal Thyself: Elisabeth of Rochlitz and the Patient's Perspective in Early Modern Germany," Bulletin of the History of Medicine (forthcoming spring 2008).
• "Becoming an Expert Practitioner: Court Experimentalism and the Medical Skills of Anna of Saxony (1532-85)," Isis: Journal of the History of Science Society 98 (March 2007): 23-53.