A Companion to Medical Anthropology

Summary

A Companion to Medical Anthropology examines the current issues, controversies, and state of the field in medical anthropology today.

Examines the key issues and current debates in medical anthropology
Provides an expert view of the major topics and themes to concern the discipline since its founding in the 1960s
Written by leading international scholars in medical anthropology
Covers environmental health, global health, biotechnology, syndemics, nutrition, substance abuse, infectious disease, and sexuality and reproductive health, and other topics

Author Biography

Merrill Singer, PhD is Professor at the Department of Anthropology, University of Connecticut; and Senior Research Scientist at the Center for Health, Intervention and Prevention and Professor of Anthropology, University of Connecticut. He has published over 200 articles and is author/co-author or editor of over 20 books. For his work in the field of medical anthropology, Dr Singer has been awarded a number of prestigious awards, including the Rudolph Virchow Prize, the AIDS and Anthropology Paper Prize, the George Foster Memorial Award in Practicing Anthropology.

Pamela I. Erickson, PhD is Professor at the Department of Anthropology and Department of Community Medicine, University of Connecticut Formerly editor of the scholarly journal Medical Anthropology Quarterly, she is a Fellow of the American Anthropological Association and the Society for Applied Anthropology, and has also served on the Governing Council of the Family and Reproductive Health Section of the American Public Health Association.

Synopsis of Contents.

List of Figures.

List of Tables.

Notes on Contributors.

Acknowledgments – Personal.

Acknowledgments – Sources.

Introduction.

Part I Theories, Applications, and Methods.

1 Medical Anthropology in Disciplinary Context: Definitional Struggles and Key Debates (or Answering the Cri Du Coeur) (Elisa J. Sobo).

2 Critical Biocultural Approaches in Medical Anthropology (Tom Leatherman and Alan H. Goodman).

3 Applied Medical Anthropology: Praxis, Pragmatics, Politics, and Promises (Robert T. Trotter, II).

4 Research Design and Methods in Medical Anthropology (Clarence C. Gravlee).

5 Medical Anthropology and Public Policy (Merrill Eisenberg).

Part II Contexts and Conditions.

6 Culture and the Stress Process (William W. Dressler).

7 Global Health (Craig R. Janes and Kitty K. Corbett).

8 Syndemics in Global Health (Merrill Singer, D. Ann Herring, Judith Littleton, and Melanie Rock).

9 The Ecology of Disease and Health (Patricia K. Townsend).

10 The Medical Anthropology of Water (Linda M. Whiteford and Cecilia Vindrola Padros0.

11 Political Violence, War and Medical Anthropology (Barbara Rylko-Bauer and Merrill Singer).

Part III Health and Behavior.

12 Humans in a World of Microbes: The Anthropology of Infectious Disease (Peter J. Brown, George J. Armelagos, and Kenneth C. Maes).

13 Sexuality, Medical Anthropology, and Public Health (Pamela I. Erickson).

14 Situating Birth in the Anthropology of Reproduction (Carolyn Sargent and Lauren Gulbas).

15 Nutrition and Health (David A. Himmelgreen, Nancy Romero Daza and Charlotte A. Noble).

16 Anthropologies of Cancer and Risk, Uncertainty and Disruption (Lenore Manderson).

17 Generation RX: Anthropological Research on Pharmaceutical Enhancement, Lifestyle Regulation, Self-Medication and Recreational Drug Use (Gilbert Quintero and Mark Nichter).

18 Anthropology and the Study of Illicit Drug Use (J. Bryan Page).

Part IV Healthwork: Care, Treatment, and Communication.

19 Ethnomedicine (Marsha B. Quinlan).

20 Medical Pluralism: An Evolving and Contested Concept in Medical Anthropology (Hans A. Baer).

21 Biotechnologies of Care (Julie Park and Ruth Fitzgerald).

22 Social Interaction and Technology: Cultural Competency and the Universality of Good Manners (Kathryn Coe, Gail Barker, and Craig Palmer).

23 Biocommunicability (Charles L. Briggs).

24 Anthropology at the End of Life (Ron Barrett).

Part V The Road Ahead.

25 Operationalizing a Right to Health: Theorizing a National Health System as a "Commons" (Sandy Smith-Nonini and Beverly Bell).

26 As the Future Explodes into the Present: Emergent Issues and the Tomorrow of Medical Anthropology (Merrill Singer and Pamela I. Erickson).

Index.

Supplemental Materials

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