Jo Ann Ashley 30 Years Later: Legacy for Practice

Abstract

Jo Ann Ashley, nurse scholar, educator, and feminist activist died at age 41 in 1980. Ashley illuminated the historical foundations of modern medicine, nursing, and hospital care in her pivotal book published in 1976, Hospitals, Paternalism, and the Role of the Nurse. Ashley’s innovative research uncovered a web of pervasive gender and class bias in the delivery of healthcare in the United States. This column commemorates the 30-year anniversary of that publication with a remembrance of her life and ideas. It examines Ashley’s relevance for nursing theory and current practice through an analysis of her many scholarly works and through interviews with those who knew her.