I have always been interested in medicine so learning more about medical anthropology seemed fitting to me. I think the subfield of medical anthropology is extremely important to understand as it draws on social, cultural, biological and linguistic anthropology. We can better understand how health is affected and determine what the best routes are for prevention and treatment of sicknesses and diseases.
The website I chose to explore was from the Department of Anthropology at Stanford University. The reading discusses the study of medical anthropology. The general definition of medical anthropology is the study of “how health and illness are shaped, experienced, and understood in light of global, historical, and political forces”. Some of Stanford’s principal areas include “cultures of medicine, the social nature of emergent biotechnology, the economic of bodily injury, psychic expression of the disorder, the formation of social networks on health…” They focus on many different subfields of anthropology. This includes cultural anthropology, biological anthropology, and even linguistic anthropology as Stanford explains about their medical anthropology program. Their goal is to “understanding of the coproduction of disease and phenomena like poverty, social status, global standing, racism, and nationalism”.
Stanford continues to explain how medical anthropology is a subfield of biological anthropology mostly. It focuses on the evolution of humans and our ancestors. It also studies the variation between human populations. Stanford focuses on the process through which illness and suffering are produced and lied. This not only ties to biological anthropology but cultural as well. They focus their study on poor families and communities that have a population struggling with addiction, depression, and incarceration. Understanding these communities through a biological and cultural perspective helps to understand how to reform these issues.
Another study done by Stanford is concerned with the ways in which stories get told about injuries. Again, biologically this focuses on the relationship of humans to other humans. Taking a linguistic approach, however, also helps us in understanding how this may be related to culture. This shows us the importance of how injuries are thought to be caused and how that matters.
One more study Stanford has researched is how global and historical notions of health, disease, race, and power yield biological consequences that bear on scientific definitions of human difference. The focus is on inequality and minorities throughout the globe that are often not included in medical narratives of genetic disease. This focus takes on a biological and a cultural perspective along with the understanding of the medical anthropology subfield.
The medical anthropology subfield is made up of the biological, cultural, and linguistic subfields of anthropology with a main focus on the biological perspective. We can learn a lot about humans and how to better health through the medical anthropology perspective.
https://anthropology.stanford.edu/research-projects/medical-anthropology
The chosen website is fulfilling to the theme of anthropology, it also illustrates the interconnected between each subfield of anthropology. While each subfield had their own subdivision, I think they all composite together to address the main objective which is to study humankind. Medical Anthropology is a subfield I find collective and analytic, towards different factors related to health, furthermore showcases the intersections between all the subfields. Stanford using both biological and cultural anthropology to approach and analysis their goals would be very useful because as we learned in Bio-culture lecture that biology and culture affect one another. An example of the study used above elucidates how science and cultural are linked to certain extend. I think your blog reflected well on the current class material and how information given is apply daily in anthropological industry.
I have always had an interest in the medical side of anthropology. Throughout the generations, it is no question that each culture finds their own ways to heal and restore their people. When I took a class on medical anthropology, the most interesting aspect was learning the different ways each community deals with the same disease or illness. Both practices may work, even if dealt very differently. It is very interesting that Sanford decided to focus in on the cultural aspects of medicine as well, dealing with minorities not having equal treatment with healthcare. In the United States, healthcare is not free, and the fact that there are so many people struggling to afford basic healthcare is morally unacceptable. We see a trend with this and minorities in the USA alone. Everyone is different and should be treated equally, no matter the financial income or their race/ethnicity.