Anthropology of Medicine

'Holism' , strangely enough, given the absolute quality it indicates, is a concept that can only be grasped through negative examples: what it is contrary to, the paradigms to which it constitutes an alternative. Definitions of 'holism' thus usually involve the interdependence among the parts composing an individual object; their relationship with that object as their container and sum; its insertion within a context, environmental or cosmic; and crucially, the existence of an additional quid which defines that object as a totality independent of its components-the idea that 'the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.' In all these senses, the significance of the relationship between 'parts' and 'whole' can be much broader than the medical and anatomical discussions with which we would most immediately associate it, and which are under the spotlight in this volume. The breadth and malleability of the concept are key to a cultural history which is extremely long, despite the fact that 'holism' itself, like many such labels, can easily be seen as anachronistic if applied to the pre-modern world. This chapter aims to offer a glimpse of this long history and to illustrate the relevance of the Graeco-Roman past to our understanding of the idea of holism, and to its various manifestations throughout the centuries which separate us from the ancients. 1 The Challenges of Holism The fact that 'holism' still lacks the status of a univocal, free-standing item in cultural history or philosophy is due to more essential reasons than those implied by its recent history and current popularity, with their sometimes imprecise and amateurish usages. A double challenge to defining the concept is posed by it being inherently relative and by its involvement in the idea of value. First of all, 'holism' has a situated quality that resists any attempt at precision , a circumstance that far exceeds the contingent datum of the recent coinage of the name itself. The impossibility of a univocal 'holism' is due to the truism that 'whole' and 'parts' are relative, non-neutral entities. What we consider a whole, which 'parts' we choose to highlight, and 'what we let into Chiara Thumiger-9789004443143 Heruntergeladen von Brill.com12/16/2020

The healing tradition has been formed over a long period of time-for as long as humanity has existed. As long as there have been diseases and injuries, treatments and healing methods have been sought. This tradition is based on mythically magical notions of world design and natural processes. Some of these old beliefs and perceptions are still present in the modern society. They generally take the form of unconscious reactions to injuries, family traditions, and commonplace means used at home to heal minor ailments. The theme of the research is based on the developing trends present in the Latvian society over the last decades. Namely, there is a growing interest in traditional healing, and modern use of ancient methods. Increasingly, people seek natural products and traditional healing means to improve their health and well-being. There is a growing supply of curing procedures and traditional therapeutic health procedures in saunas and bathhouses. This trend indicates the relevance of traditional healing methods in the modern context. The subject of the research is the Latvian healing tradition, its tools and practiced methods. The author investigates the development and the succession of this tradition through generations. In this research, the healing tradition is also referred to as folk healing and folk medicine. When studying the Latvian tradition of healing, research focuses on the old tradition and its practitioners, predominantly living in the countryside-not knowing or recognizing such healing as a particular activity. The study highlights the part of the tradition that is being passed from one generation to another. The title of the research has already set the boundary lines of the study; namely, the study describes the Latvian national tradition, keeping in mind that it relates to its neighbouring nations. However, one research cannot cover either the traditions of all peoples living in Latvia or all the traditions that have affected it from the outside. The use of the term "Latvians" in the title of the work is specified. Describing the development of the healing tradition, the periods of history in which there was not yet a single Latvian nation have also been depicted. The description of the oldest traditions relates to the tribes that at the time were settled in the Latvian territory (Courlanders, Livonians, Semigallians, Selonians, and Latgallians). The research has selected and considered the oldest methods of traditional treatment of Latvian people that are mainly verbally transmitted through generations, as well as the healing remedies used from nature's local bounty. When studying the relevance and the following of tradition in today's world, the interviews have been conducted with people who have inherited the traditions from their ancestors, instead of those who have studied it from literature, courses or educational institutions. Most interviews have been conducted in rural settings, asking the elderly about the tradition of healing, among which some were found with a deeper and wider knowledge of folk medicine. People who call themselves healers advertise themselves as such or practice healing as their main profession, were deliberately not chosen for this study. It was done to avoid the impact of modern-day institutionalized and foreign healing practices, while focusing on the earliest folk tradition, inherited from the ancestors.

The Mesopotamian goddess known as Gula, appears to emerge and intertwine with earlier goddess figures Baba/Bawa and Bau - themselves protective, healing dog deities of Sumer and Akkad. Some scholars believe the name Bau/ Bawa/Baba to be onomatopoeic, mimicking the bowow of a dog bark. Baba and Bau probably echo an even more ancient reverence for dogs as creatures of healing and protection. A reverence cultivated by the close companionship, coevolution and cooperation between humans and canines since the Stone Age.

"Representations", N. 129, Winter 2015.

The essay analyzes the project of maintaining the body of V. I. Lenin in the Mausoleum in Moscow for the past ninety years, focusing on the unique biological science that developed around this project, and the unexpected political role this body has performed.

Artykuł ukazał sie w/This article was published in: Bożena Płonka-Syroka, Mateusz Dąsal (red.), Medycyna i religia, t. 1, Wydawnictwo DiG/Edition La Rama, Warszawa-Bellerive-sur-Allier 2017, s. 259-287.
“In My Name They Will Cast Out Demons...” — Exorcism (Deliverance) as a Kind of “Behavioral Therapy” in the “Third Wave” Pentecostalism in the USA and Canada: Basically demonopathic diagnostics in “Third Wave” of pentecostal movements is based on the evaluation of behavior of the person, which refers to certain behavioral approaches on the ground of clinical psychology. In this standard of interpretation behavior is the essence of diagnosis and therapeutic action. If the case of movements being discussed, eff ectiveness of “deliverance therapy” and the prognosis for “patient” is evaluated on the basis of presence or relief of “symptoms”. Complex
model of demonopathy which consists of seven stages, can result in / represent a complex model of therapy, although “therapeutic tools” are quite poor and limited to the prayers of deliverance and / or fasting in those movements. The procedure is on an individual basis or is a long process which consists of repetition of the same pattern of therapeutic action.

Foucault's argument that a major break occurred in the nature of power in the European Eighteenth century-an unprecedented socialization of medicine and concern for the health of bodies and populations, the birth of biopolitics-has become since the 1990s a dominant narrative among sociologists but is rarely if ever scrutinized in its premises. This article problematizes Foucault's periodization about the politics of health and the way its story has been solidified into an uncritical account. Building on novel historiographic work, it challenges the modernist bias of histories of biopolitics and public health and considers an earlier and more plural history of collective practices of health of which the story told by Foucault is just one important episode. Finally, it discusses the implications of this revised model for wider sociological debates on the link between modernity, health and the body.

While modern medicine is typically imagined as a solution to public health problems, it also transforms people's experiences of their bodies, rearranges social relationships, and raises a range of moral questions and controversies. This course deals with the transformations and conundrums that biomedical practice has brought about in Muslim-majority societies, with particular attention to Islamic law, policy, gender, and everyday life. We will read texts from anthropology, history and Islamic bioethics on a variety of biomedical topics. A central aim of this course is to think critically about what constitutes " Islam " and the " Islamic " through an examination of biomedical encounters in the Muslim World. Who are figures of authority in Islamic law and Islamic bioethics? How is this authority constituted and challenged? How do individual Muslims decide whether a medical intervention is Islamic? What are the historical, political, and social factors that have contributed to the above? We will think about these questions and others in an effort to gain a critical perspective on, 1-Islam and the many facets of Islamic subjectivity, and 2-biomedicine as an assemblage of non-neutral knowledges, practices, and dispositions. In our module on " medicine and modernity " we will read historical texts to learn about how the disciplining of human bodies through medical practices and knowledge served colonial projects, and how biomedicine became a central category through which reform by both Islamist and secular modernists took place. Subsequent modules will address contemporary biomedical encounters in the Muslim World through the themes of organ transplantation, transsexuality, reproduction, and psychiatry. Assignments and Requirements Attendance You are expected to attend each class having read the assignments and be prepared to engage in class discussion. More than one absence throughout the quarter will negatively affect your course grade. Course Readings You will be able to find all assigned articles on the course website at least one week prior to their assigned date. Assigned books will be available at the bookstore and on reserve at the Regenstein Library. Digital versions of some of these books are also available on the University of Chicago Library website.

What can anthropological and folkloristic approaches to food, gender, and medicine tell us about these topics in the Middle Ages beyond the textual evidence itself? Balancing the Humours: Women, Food, and Diet in the Middle Ages uses these approaches to look at the textual traditions of dietary recommendations for women’s health, placed within the context of the larger cultural concerns of gender roles and Church teachings about women. Women are expected to be nurturers, healers, and the primary locus of food provisioning for families, especially when considering the lower social classes which are typically overlooked in the written record. What can we know about women, food, medicine, and diet in the Middle Ages and how does the written medical tradition interact with folk medicine and other cultural factors in both understanding women’s bodies and their roles as healers and food providers.

Assumptions regarding the relationship between the ontological categories of "food" and "drug" undergird a substantial amount of academic discourse, and also function as key components in worldviews beyond the academy. Despite the prevalence of these ontological assumptions, little work has been done in foregrounding them to allow for critique and consideration of alternative perspectives. This entry provides an overview of this emerging discussion within food ontology, as well as various perspectives on the food-drug relationship and ethical implications of these views. The term "drug" is employed to refer to a broader category of substances which encompasses "medicine" while also including substances used for recreational, religious, and other non-medical purposes (e.g. drugs in the detrimental/addictive sense).

This article gives insight into the anticipatory terms and affective states through which women’s future age-related infertility is conceptualised in relation to the medical possibility of cryopreserving eggs. It does so through an analysis of Marieke Schellart’s documentary Eggs for Later.

Temporary free access: http://authors.elsevier.com/a/1S9Uu-6kq9Acu

Women's Studies International Forum
Volume 53, November–December 2015, Pages 119–128
doi:10.1016/j.wsif.2014.10.019

Abstract

With the introduction of the reproductive technology of egg freezing (oocyte cryopreservation), new cultural and clinical practices of anticipating bodily futurity emerge. The documentary Eggs for Later ( Schellart, 2010), which features diverse medical, political and personal discourses on egg freezing, gives insight into the anticipatory terms and affective states through which women’s future age-related infertility is conceptualised in relation to the medical possibility of cryopreserving eggs. My analysis of the documentary draws attention to the contesting interpretations of egg freezing as postponement of motherhood, extension of fertility and biopreparedness for future infertility. What is at stake is the potential of various modes of anticipating bodily futurity to reconfigure ideas and practices of what constitutes healthy embodiment, the reproductive process and responsible ageing. From the analysis follows that egg freezing may function not only to potentially achieve future reproduction, but to resolve anticipatory anxiety by maintaining the futurity of potential motherhood.

Articulating how to enact a sensory skill is a challenging prospect, as illustrated through the teaching and learning of novices. This article examines strategies employed to overcome the challenges of sharing sensory experience by exploring how medical professionals learn and teach skills of listening to sound: that is, of teaching medical students, and of medical students learning, sonic skills. The article draws on ethnographic research conducted in medical schools and hospitals in Australia and The Netherlands and on historical research conducted in medical archives and libraries in France, the UK and the US, from the 1950s until present. The first part of the paper focuses on the key, often creative, solutions our participants constructed for sharing their knowledge of body sounds, and techniques for its analysis. These didactic solutions are organized in three sections: demonstration; mimicry and repetition; and rhythm and improvisation. We argue that no one strategy leads to the enskillment of novices in listening, but rather, that through the co-ordination of practices of learning and teaching there is an attempt to obtain “sonic alignment”. The second part of the article extends our study of sharing sounds by examining how researchers learn about sonic skills from research participants. Looking at the proposed methodological solutions to the conundrum of how to share audible experience, we reflect on our own ethnographic and historical techniques to attempt sonic alignment with those we study. By integrating into our analysis how we, as researchers, enacted our research material, we understand more about how life we study is enacted too.

Si bien las investigaciones sobre TDA-H han tendido
a dejar los aspectos diferenciales de género en
un lugar secundario, recientes contribuciones
emanadas principalmente desde la epidemiología
han revelado que esta categoría diagnóstica parece
estar fuertemente relacionada con el reparto de
los géneros. Sin embargo, dichas contribuciones
parecen limitar sus alcances al estudio de la
sintomatología y funcionamiento cognitivo, afectivo
y social de los(as) niños(as), dejando de lado aspectos
subjetivos asociados a las prácticas de diagnóstico
y tratamiento de TDA-H. De este modo, el objetivo
de este artículo es explorar cómo la dimensión
de género configura la experiencia subjetiva de
niños(as) diagnosticados(as) con TDA-H. A partir de
la realización de entrevistas abiertas realizadas a
niños entre 7 y 13 años, damos cuenta de tendencias
generales que articulan género y características
asociadas al diagnóstico de TDA-H, a la vez que,
con experiencias infantiles que dislocan tales
tendencias. Los resultados se agruparon en función
de cuatro dimensiones emergentes del material
producido en las entrevistas: (1) localizaciones;
(2) habilidades; (3) abordajes; (4) interacciones.
Así, mostraremos cómo la experiencia de niños y
niñas es múltiple en relación al diagnóstico y no
es posible reducirla a una perspectiva binaria en
torno al género

Experiences of autism-spectrum disorder are now increasingly studied by social scientists. Human-animal relations have also become a major focus of social inquiry in recent years. Examining horse-assisted therapy for autistic spectrum disorders, this is the first paper that brings these fields together. Drawing on participant observation and interviews at a UK horse therapy Centre, this article examines how staff and the parents of riders account for the successes and limitations of equine therapy. To the respondents, horses 'open up' autistic children and make possible interactions that seemed impossible before. Horses were regarded as facilitating the emergence of apparently social behaviours, which included eye contact, pointing, and speech. Three key explanations emerged for therapeutic success: the sensorial, embodied experience of riding the horse; the specific movements and rhythms of the horse; and, the 'personality' of the horse. Equine therapy can be regard...

In Gilgit, capital of the Gilgit-Baltistan region in northern Pakistan, leucorrhea - vaginal discharge known in the vernacular as safaid pani, or 'white water' - serves as both a medical diagnosis and signifier of the chronicity of the reproductive, social, and emotional burdens endured by women. While ethnomedical providers explained safaid pani as resulting from relatively benign forms of 'weakness', which required minimal dietary or ethno-botanical recourse, allopathic physicians approached discharge as evidence of numerous pathologies that necessitated protracted and sometimes also expensive treatments. Physicians' clinical assessments were not solely biomedical, but also integrated informal folk and formal ethnomedical theories of causation. Clinical diagnoses that affirmed leucorrhea as a pathophysiology substantiated women's belief that it was proof of the destructive effects of sustained social inequity, peril, and distress on the body, and the uterus in particular. Women and their treating providers recognized the power of the (dys)functional uterus to not only threaten women's reproductive wellness but also their social, marital, and familial status, which hinged on their ability to become pregnant and give birth, to sons especially. Because of the ailing uterus's expansive importance, weeping wombs served as a potent source for women's claims making and calls for attention and care.

Experiences of autism-spectrum disorder are now increasingly studied by social scientists. Human–animal relations have also become a major focus of social inquiry in recent years. Examining horse-assisted therapy for autistic spectrum disorders, this is the first paper that brings these fields together. Drawing on participant observation and interviews at a UK horse therapy Centre, this article examines how staff and the parents of riders account for the successes and limitations of equine therapy. To the respondents, horses ‘open up’ autistic children and make possible interactions that seemed impossible before. Horses were regarded as facilitating the emergence of apparently social behaviours, which included eye contact, pointing, and speech. Three key explanations emerged for therapeutic success: the sensorial, embodied experience of riding the horse; the specific movements and rhythms of the horse; and, the ‘personality’ of the horse. Equine therapy can be regarded as enabling a...

Obstetrics in Ancient Mesopotamia

Physiological birth was considered as difficult and painful moment, but not a disease in Ancient Mesopotamia. Births took place at home with the help of midwives called šabsútu. Birth was accompanied with several magical rituals which should have helped to accelerate the delivery, reduce pain and protect again evil causing complication. Physicians tried to solve various complications - delayed birth, un-proceeding birth, painful firth, etc. They used a combination of pharmaceutical, mechanical and psychosomatic therapy. Complications were really common and in most cases terminate by death.

Les animaux, mentionnés dans les formules magiques, participent aux processus de protection et de guérison des hommes. Ce sont notamment des substances animales qui étaient employées dans la composition des remèdes (iatro)magiques. À l’exception des exemples se référant aux textes mythologiques, quels étaient les critères de sélection des ingrédients d’origine faunique dans ces recettes ? L’utilisation de substances animales était-elle liée à la symbolique de la bête vivante ? Ou le choix d’une catégorie d’animaux résultait-il de réminiscences de savoirs ancestraux et d’essais thérapeutiques anciens ? Cette communication tentera d’appréhender le rôle concret de l’animal ou des substances animales dans les pratiques médico-religieuses en Égypte ancienne.

Actes du colloque qui s'est tenu à Paris (Maison de la Recherche) les 6 et 7 juin 2016.

The availability of free antiretroviral treatment in public health facilities since 2004 has contributed to the increasing biomedicalization of AIDS care in Kenya. This has been accompanied by a reduction of funding for community-based care and support organizations since the 2008 global economic crisis and a consequent donor divestment from HIV projects in Africa. This paper explores the ways that HIV interventions, including support groups, home-based care and antiretroviral treatments have shaped expectations regarding relations of care in the low-income area of Kibera in Nairobi, Kenya, over the last decade. Findings are based on 20 months of ethnographic research conducted in Nairobi between January 2011 and August 2013. By focusing on three eras of HIV treatment--pre-treatment, treatment scale-up, and post-crisis--the authors illustrate how family and community-based care have changed with shifts in funding. Many support groups that previously provided HIV care in Kibera, wher...

Sobotková, Veronika: Magie v léčbě starověké Mezopotámie. In: Pecha, Lukáš a kol. Materiální a duchovní kultura Východu v proměnách času. Plzeň: Západočeská univerzita v Plzni, 2012. s. 18-27.

Kapitola neprve hodnotí pojetí magie ve starověké Mezopotámii v antropologické perspektivě. Dále popisuje průběh typických magických léčebných rituálů s ohledem na jejich průběh a typický obsah. Závěrem hodnotí účinnost magie v rámci léčebného procesu.

The topic of symbolic, physical and mental illness in the Balkans allows access from different perspectives: historical, ethnological and anthropological, Although in many, camouflaged aspects, such as the use of geographic and geo-political euphemisms, from Southeastern Europe to the Western Balkans, the trend of marginalization of this part of Europe continues to this day. The symbolic aspect of its marginalization reflects in politics and, therefore, the everyday life. Along with the symbolic, metaphorical and discursive linking of the Balkans and illness, we are witnessing an increased interest in illness in public discourse, especially in the journalism. The illness becomes one of the fashionable, both modern, postmodern themes, and enters into the area of popular culture. Dramatic evidence of an increase in malignancy and autoimmune diseases has been followed by a refusal of the official immunization practice, which is being questioned and considered rather as a challenge than a disease protection. Diseases and "deformations" are often associated with bombing, wars and the disposal of nuclear and other waste into the peripheral part of the world. Apart from this dimension, disease and treatment of it remain an indispensable part of the cultural history of the Balkans.

Commentary for Dr. Carlo Caduff's The Pandemic Perhaps, an ethnographic manuscript (Univ. California Press, 2015). Explores the contemporary policy dialogues within the US-led Global Health Security Agenda. Published on Somatosphere.net, April 2016: http://somatosphere.net/?p=11454

This paper analyses the lived experiences of people living with HIV in South Africa through the use of body mapping as a visual research method, by focusing on the physical and symbolic use of the body within the broader context of anthropology and medical anthropology. The study consists of an empirical analysis of the body maps themselves and the accompanied narratives of seven participants, six female and one male participant living with HIV in South Africa. Drawing upon theories and literature on theorising the body in medical anthropology and visual research, this study explores the significance of this practice as a visual research method in understanding the nuanced lived experiences of people living with HIV by highlighting the individuality of the body and emotions; embodied experiences: a bio-cultural approach; and the body politic: social injustice. The results of this study illustrate that body mapping is a unique visual research method, that explores the body as the vehicle in which we exist within the world, while containing a vast amount of layered interpretive and cultural meanings, which are key to understanding the lived experience of people from marginalised groups.

Women who have immigrated to the United States from Mexico have better than expected birth outcomes. Part of this apparent health ‘paradox’ has been explained by high levels of social support which are thought to offset known risk factors for low birth weight. Yet common measures of social support during pregnancy suffer from presumptions of cultural homogeneity and a-priori definitions

ABSTRACT The physical worlds which individuals inhabit are extensions of what they consciously contrive, and in the narratives individuals write in and of their lives one often sees the means by which that consciousness pours itself out into the world, bringing a personal version of ...

SOBOTKOVÁ, V. Duchové a démoni v lékařství starověké Mezopotámie. Nový Orient, 2012, roč. 67, č. 4, s. 30-34.

Ghosts and demons of ancient Mesopotamia played a significant role in the daily life of common people where they acted as one of the main causes of illnesses and other misfortune. Medical texts therefore appear as an important source that gives us insight into these malevolent forces. The article presents selected ghosts, demon Lamaštu, demon Lilû / Lilītu / Ardat-lilî, demon rābiṣu, demon Šulak and demon Gallû from the perspective of medical texts – especially diagnostic and prognostic series SA.GIG and therapeutical texts. It tries to assign particular ghosts and demons to the specific health problems. The effort of Mesopotamian physicians is evident : the systematic classification of diseases (and symptoms) according to the type of difficulties using the names of ghosts and demons (and gods as well). The article reflects the conception of ghosts and demons as a cause of disease as well and presents several remarkable examples of healing rituals for their repulse.

Gynecology in Ancient Mesopotamia

Medicine in ancient Mesopotamia was institutionalized discipline, physicians were systematically educated, medical practice was based on a written tradition, which includes long-term experience and observation. Gynecology, pregnancy care and obstetrics were an important part of the medical tradition. Non-medical Mesopotamian texts describe the physical picture of the ideal fertile women and medical texts complete information about the menstruation, state of the external genitalia, and the occurrence of various gynecological complications. Physicians were acquainted with the principles of conception and length of pregnancy. They tried to verify the pregnancy using the primitive methods. The most frequent problems described in the texts were infertility, bleeding in pregnancy and miscarriages. Physicians were treating these problems using a combination of magic and pharmaceutical therapy.

Call for Papers: Biobanks. The entanglement of forms of participation, identities and biovalues in emerging biobanking configurations.
Tecnoscienza. The Italian Journal of Science & Technology Studies.
Guest Editors: Christine Hauskeller and Lorenzo Beltrame (University of Exeter)

Deadline for abstract submissions: April 20th, 2017

We welcome papers that address the following questions:
• How do different forms of involvements of patients, citizens and other non-expert actors shape biobanks configurations?
• How are subjectivities and collective identities shaped by the involvement in biobanking activities?
• How are these varying forms of biosocial participation linked to the production of biovalue, and which kinds of biovalues generated?