We often take for granted the experience of having a body and the meanings of being healthy and of sickness. Nevertheless, our bodily experiences and understandings of health and illness are profoundly shaped by and, in return, influence our social, cultural, and political circumstances.
Medical anthropology examines affliction and healing across different cultural and historical
contexts. In this course, we will study the complex interactions between biology, culture,
ideology, and society in the construction of “medical facts.“
In this introductory course on medical anthropology we will first gain some knowledge about basic concepts, theoretical frameworks and methodologies of the anthropology of health. After discussing concepts of health, illness, healing and the medical profession, we will mainly cover three broader research areas of medical anthropology:
• Critical Food Studies
• Anthropology of Mental Health
• and Hospital Ethnography.
Using global examples and cases, by the end of the course, students will have a better grasp of the theories and methods of medical anthropology, and will also be able to critically reflect on their own and others’ experiences of dis-ease and healing, as well as on representations of human suffering and medical technologies.
We will collectively be reading several books that are all available as ebooks via SuUB. You are expected to read ONE book in full and act as an „expert“ on that book during the respective classes. I do not expect you to complete all three books, though of course it will help the discussion if you have read more.
While the main course language is English, you can always speak German in class and do your assessment (Prüfungsleistung) in German.
Required reading (all available as ebooks via SuUB):
Emily Yates-Doerr: The weight of obesity
Karen Nakamura: Disability of the Soul
Alice Street: Biomedicine in an unstable place
