ANTH 2230 - Medical Anthropology

Medical anthropology is a subfield of general anthropology drawing primarily on cultural anthropological principles to address issues of human health and illness. In this class we will use empirical examples from around the world to understand how individuals experience health and illness and how their cultural context shapes their understanding of illness and healing. This will require us to move beyond the narrow focus of health and illness as biological processes. We will explore medicine as a cultural system and learn to unpack the complexities of specific medical systems (such as biomedicine) and consider how different medical systems can be seen to complement one another. We will look at historical and political processes that have shaped individuals’ quality of life and critically explore the social structures that prevent the eradication of global health concerns.

General Education Social & Behavioral Sciences General Education
Prerequisite(s): WRIT 1101