ANT 319 Anthropology of Global Health

3 hours 

In this course, students will examine the principles, methods, and approaches of applied medical anthropology in national and international health settings, where anthropologists attempt to develop effective public health education and disease control programs. Students will explore central issues and key questions in the anthropology of global health. How do social forces become embodied as pathologies? How do political, economic, and historic trends influence the distribution of disease among different populations? How will new trends in the organization of healthcare affect the most vulnerable members of society? Drawing on medical anthropology work in South Asia, the Philippines, Mozambique, Rwanda, Haiti, and the U.S., students will examine ways in which anthropologists understand global health problems in a larger cultural, historical, ecological, and political-economic context, and the role of indigenous health culture and solutions to local public health problems.