When people say “global health,” they usually mean delivering Western medicine in low-resource settings. This assumes that medicine is a universal good. Is it? Or is biomedicine also a “culture” – with values, practices and understandings built in a particular place and time? What are medicine’s ethics, symbols, economies, experiences of the body, and politics? What happens when these things run up against other ways of viewing the world? In this course, through scholarship and popular media, and through the instructor’s experiences as a practicing physician and anthropologist, we will explore mind-bending paradoxes about what we assume to be true, explore aspects of medical practice, and describe why those practices often have unexpected results when they travel.

Class Format:

Lecture will be synchronous and recorded. Section will be synchronous. Testing for this course will be open-book and asynchronous and will consist of short answer and essay questions that will be submitted via Canvas during a designated time frame. The course will use Canvas for assignments, syllabus and grading. Lecture and section will be synchronous and conducted via Zoom. Lecture will be recorded and posted on Canvas. Students should have access to camera, microphone and an internet connection able to support zoom video interactions.