Female Missionaries and the Architecture of Women’s Hospitals

Abstract

The issue of gaining trust was relevant to activities of both male and female missionaries, but female missionaries were seen as better suited for this task. This chapter highlights female missionaries’ involvement in the design process of the hospitals. A particular concern of the chapter is Dr Minnie Gomery, who was responsible for designing the Islamabad (Anantnag) hospital. Furthermore, the chapter shows that female medical missionaries did not universally and uniformly seek to modernise and enlighten women. This point is nowhere more evident than in the architecture of the medical missions. A specific type of hospital architecture, known as the ‘Purdah hospital’, was developed specifically for women according to what missionaries understood as Muslim and Hindu rules.