Abstract
The late Dr Frances Rix Ames (1920-2002) was a very remarkable historical character. This dissertation considers certain aspects of her life as a lens for seeing historical events in medicine during the mid to late 20th century. Her career demonstrates several aspects of progressive politics within medicine, what it pushed against and its contradictions. The first area I will be concentrating on is the well-known 1958 dagga research and others written in the 1970s that represents an innovative methodology. Second, is her involvement in the campaign against doctors who gave false witnesses in the Steve Biko inquest, and the impact of this campaign also on medical ethics. Lastly, her book on mothering, and her curiosity in mothering and practices of care, which included publications comparing African mothers living in rural and urban spaces. I also aim to show her motivations, her challenges as a woman in the field, and personal experiences that bear on her approach to neuropsychiatry and to her politics. My research will be based on archival materials, newspapers, secondary sources, as well as conducting oral interviews with those who knew her and worked with her. In contrast to other biographies of South African doctors with progressive views that have been written as ‘struggle heroes’, my work will focus on Ames's research and clinical practice, and the wider influence it had on medicine and medical knowledge, both in South Africa and globally.