ANTHRO 366

Medicine, Power and Politics

Description

This course explores the interplay between cultural values, local politics, national politics and international health programmes and initiatives in order to examine how experiences of medical care and ideas of illness and health vary across different cultural groups and sociocultural settings.

Drawing from a variety of ethnographic and other anthropological works, students will examine topics such as: the relationships between medicine and the constitution of state, including colonial and postcolonial power; sociocultural debates and contestations over how disease, illness and wellness are defined; contemporary debates about access to health care and the “right to health” across a wide range of cultural settings; the role of anthropology in international health development programmes; and the impacts of local, national and international health care policies and programmes on health and, more broadly, on other sociopolitical and economic aspects of life.

Assessment

Coursework only

Availability 2025

Not taught in 2025

Lecturer(s)

Coordinator(s) Professor Susanna Trnka
Lecturer(s)  Pauline Herbst

Reading/Texts

TBA

Assessment

Coursework only

Points

ANTHRO 366: 15 points

Prerequisites

ANTHRO 203 or 30 points passed at Stage II