Want to create an interactive transcript for this episode?
Podcast: New Books in Public Policy
Episode: Elaine Schattner, "From Whispers to Shouts: The Ways We Talk about Cancer" (Columbia UP, 2023)
Description: The “war on cancer” was launched during the Nixon Administration in 1971, but the term was part of the national dialog on cancer at least early as 1913. Pink ribbons have been ubiquitous symbols of breast cancer awareness and fund-raising promotions since the mid-1980s, but “cancer weeks” fostering awareness of the disease and gala fund-raisers staged by wealthy socialites were popular beginning at least 100 years earlier. Early detection was touted as a cure at the beginning of the 20th century, long before any treatments other than primitive surgery were available, not to mention tests like mammography to detect the disease.Elai...