ANTH 548b – Medical Anthropology at the Intersections

The subfield of medical anthropology boasts a rich theoretical and empirical scholarly tradition, in which a significant number of critically acclaimed, award-winning ethnographies have been written on topics ranging from embodiment and local biologies to the health problems engendered by structural and political violence. Many medical anthropology scholars engage across the social science and humanities disciplines, drawing upon history, philosophy, political science, cultural studies, science and technology studies, and gender studies perspectives in their writing. In addition, medical anthropology intersects with medicine and public health, offering both critiques and applied interventions. This graduate seminar showcases the theoretical and ethnographic engagements of more than a dozen disciplinary leaders in the subfield of medical anthropology. Guided by the key text, Medical Anthropology at the Intersections: Histories, Activisms, and Futures—which was based on Yale’s historic medical anthropology conference held in 2009—the course will explore the canonical works of a number of leading medical anthropological thinkers, including Joao Biehl, Philippe Bourgois, Veena Das, Paul Farmer, Didier Fassin, Arthur Kleinman, Margaret Lock, Emily Martin, Mark Nichter, Adriana Petryna, Rayna Rapp, and Nancy Scheper-Hughes. Three major foci of medical anthropological engagement will be highlighted, including 1) structural violence and social suffering, 2) gender, technoscience, and embodiment, and 3) global health and humanitarianism.