166-091 Medicine, Health and Illness

Formerly available as 166-267/367. Students who have completed 166-267/367 are not eligible to enrol in this subject.

Usually two first-year sociology subjects.

This subject examines how medical knowledge, practice, and technology, as well as individual and group experiences of health and illness, are socially shaped and organised. The subject begins with analyses of the medical profession, of medical education, and of medical-state relations. The subject then considers the social experience of health and illness in terms of relations including gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality and class, with specific reference to HIV/AIDS and other case studies. Attention will then be turned to technological and scientific developments in medicine, and their role in the social construction of medicine and of medical practice. Of particular interest here will be developments in organ transplantation and cloning, and the strategies of the global biomedical and biotechnology industries. Students should complete the subject with a sociological understanding of the social, political and cultural dimensions of medicine, health and illness and have gained experience in sociological research methods.

Written work totalling 4000 words.

A subject reader will be available

• C Grbich, Health in Australia. 2nd edn, Longman, 1999.