Anthro 4127 - Language and Medical Expertise

Institution:

Washington University in St Louis

Subject:

Description:

Language plays a constitutive role in the creation and communication of medical expertise in all cultures, as well as across cultures. The goal of this course is to introduce students to the discourse-centered approach to medicine found in sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology. How is medical authority negotiated in interactions between doctors/healers and patients? How do authoritative narratives and discourses structure cultural understandings of disease, health,well-being, and the body? What role does language and its use play in legitimizing certain forms of medicine while delegitimizing others, especially in "medically plural" societies? Does Western medicinediffer from non-Western medicine with respect to the way it is created and communicated? How do ideologies of language and communication shape the way medical representations circulate in society, including across sociocultural boundaries, as in acts of translation? How are new institutional forms of communication, such as mass media and the internet, reshaping medical expertise around the world? We begin the course with the role of narrative in the construction of medical knowledge and perception, then move to the microanalyses of authoritative language in the patient-doctor "medical encounter," and end the course by turning to the macroanalysis of medical institutions, exploring them in relation to the kinds of expert texts they produce and circulate. The course draws on theoretical readings and ethnographic research conducted in many places in order to develop a cross-cultural understanding of the issues.

Credits:

3.00

Credit Hours:

Prerequisites:

Corequisites:

Exclusions:

Level:

Instructional Type:

Lecture

Notes:

Additional Information:

Historical Version(s):

Institution Website:

www.wustl.edu

Phone Number:

(314) 935-5000

Regional Accreditation:

North Central Association of Colleges and Schools

Calendar System:

Semester

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