ANTH 1899 Medical Anthropology: Health, Illness and Healing Across Cultures
This course introduces students to the ways that medical anthropologists understand disease, illness, suffering, and healing as it occurs in a complex weave of biological, psychological, cultural, environmental, and political-economic processes. The course is designed to engage students in a broad range of medical anthropology topics, including theoretical approaches and research. Issues such as chronic illness and suffering, ritual and religious forms of healing, alternative medical practices and the global spread of disease and politics of health and humanitarian intervention will be addressed. An understanding of what constitutes health, illness, and disease requires recognition of the contexts in which they are experienced and an understanding of how they are shaped by processes of local, national, and global significance. Particular emphasis, through case studies, will be placed upon the cultural context in which illnesses and other forms of suffering are experienced, narrated, and addressed. The importance of cultural competence in health-related practices (the ability to understand and communicate effectively with people from different cultures) will be emphasized.
Offered
Fall, Spring
Notes
Recommended: Eligible for
ENGC 1101 and
READ 1106