"akusherka" as insult?

[Margarita Nafpaktitis]

Dear Colleagues,

In his diaries from the late teens to the early 1920s, when Kornei
Chukovskii is particularly frustrated by female bureaucrats in the Petrograd
cultural administration, he calls them "akusherki." I've looked up the term
in several dictionaries, and the most I can find is "midwife" ("zhenshchina
so srednim meditsinskim obrazovaniem, imeiushchaia pravo samostoiatel'no
okazyvat' pomoshch' pri rodakh").

If anyone can explain why Chukovskii cast the term as an aspersion, I'd be
grateful for the enlightenment.

With thanks in advance,

Margarita

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>
Margarita Nafpaktitis
Assistant Professor of Slavic Languages & Literatures
University of Virginia
109 New Cabell Hall / PO Box 400783
Charlottesville, Virginia 22904-4783
Tel: (434) 924-3548   FAX: (434) 982-2744
http://artsandsciences.virginia.edu/slavic/people/mn2t.html

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