Lydia is a PhD candidate in the Department of History. Her research focuses on the intersections of gender, public health, and immigration at the turn of the 20th century. She is particularly interested in the work of settlement houses and milk committees in urban spaces, and how immigrant women engaged with reform projects and could lay claim to social citizenship through their mothering and hygienic practices.
Lydia’s research on Canada will explore connections between clean milk initiatives and constructions of whiteness within the transnational history of the settlement movement. Her research will center on Montreal’s Iverley Settlement, the city’s Council of Social Agencies, and the Milk Commission of the Montreal Medico-Chirurgical Society. The Hildebrand Fellowship will support her travel to Montreal in order to conduct archival research at McGill University and the Univeresité du Québec in Montreal.
Lydia holds a bachelor’s degree in English and History from Vassar College and master’s degrees in Women’s and Gender Studies and History from Brandeis University.
