Medicine in America: From the Columbian

Exchange to the Cancer WarsHI 31L

Mondays 2-4Roberta Bivins

The history of medicine and the history of America

• Why a medical perspective on the American past?– Health and the body are enduring and

immediate concerns across historical periods and peoples of America;

– Allows approaches to both natural and built environments;

– Offers a unique perspective on social and cultural trends and beliefs: shows how they filtered into and influenced PRACTICE and daily life;

– Shows interplay between cultural, political, economic and social spheres.

What kind of history is this?

•Social•Political•Economic•Cultural

Approaches to the history of medicine

• Through case studies• Through individual accounts• Through politics• Through professionalization• Through technologies, images and

artefacts• Through media representations

(Some)Themes in the module

Gender in/Gender

and Medicine

Medicine, Healthcare & Race

Professions and Professionalisation

War, Medicine and the State

Medicine and Immigration

Institutional History

Medical Education

Medicine and the Body Politic

Diseases

Medicine and

Technology