Ellen Bridson

Supervisor: Nick Hopwood

Advisor: Richard McKay

Thesis: Reproductive technologies, sexuality and agency: Lesbians’ and queer women’s experiences of donor insemination in England between 1970 and 2000

Research interests: history of reproduction and reproductive technologies; history of women’s health; history of contraception; queer medical history; oral history

Current research

Funded by the Pigott Scholarship from the University of Cambridge, my research seeks to reconstruct how lesbians and queer women experienced donor insemination in their pursuit of pregnancy amidst hostile medical, social, and political landscapes in late-twentieth century England. In contrast to the majority of scholarship on lesbian practices of assisted conception, this research bridges the divide between clinical routes to conception and non-clinical routes by exploring both avenues and teasing out practices that fell between them.

I am conducting oral history interviews across England to unearth experiences that are absent from the archives. The interviews will be archived at Bishopsgate Institute, therefore preserving and platforming these experiences for present and future generations of researchers and wider audiences. In addition to the scholarly contribution to history, social sciences, and reproduction studies, it is hoped that this research can draw on the past to offer part of a path forward for queer people in their pursuit of parenthood today.

Education

2023: MPhil Health, Medicine and Society, University of Cambridge

• My thesis, Donn Casey and the Filshie clip: A biographical and material history of a contraceptive technology, was the first historiographical account written of the Filshie clip, which grew from its inception in a garden shed in 1960s Cambridge to become a global contraceptive technology. For this research I used recently donated archival material from Donn Casey, the creator of the Filshie clip, at the University Library in Cambridge.

2021: BA History and Politics, University of Nottingham

• For my final year dissertation, Have I got to go through this every month of my life? An analysis of modern femininity through advertisements of menstrual products in England between 1920 and 1970, I conducted primary research at the Boots Archives in Beeston to explore how femininity was constructed through menstrual product advertisements and changed over time.

Scholarships and Awards

(2025- 2028) Piggot Scholarship from the University of Cambridge, which provides full funding to support the research of two PhD students per year

(2022- 2023) Rausing, Williamson, and Lipton Studentship for MPhil students

(2022- 2023) British Society for the History of Science Masters Bursary to support outstanding master’s students

(2021) Undergraduate Dissertation Award from the University of Nottingham, which recognises the most exceptional undergraduate dissertation in history

Presentations 

Jesus College Postgraduate Research Conference, March 2026

• Self Insemination (SI) and Artificial Insemination by Donor (AID): Grey areas of lesbian insemination between 1970 and 1986

Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Cambridge, May 2026

• Unpicking the clinical/ non-clinical binary: Lesbian experiences of donor insemination before 1986 in England