This interdisciplinary course of critical medical humanities examines contemporary literary and filmic texts that shape ethical thought about health and wellbeing. We will read major texts that problematize and hypothesize the relation between self and community; immunity and toxicity; power and medical interventions; faith and healing; and knowledge and narrative. This course aims to widen the “medical” beyond the scene of clinical encounter through close engagements with critical theory about the body and the self as embodied subjectivity. In our readings, we will discuss and debate the meaning and practices of responsibility, endurance, and imagination that challenge assumptions about the illness experience, caregiving, and the production of medical knowledge.

contemporary literary and filmic texts that shape ethical thought about health and wellbeing

the relation between self and community; immunity and toxicity; power and medical interventions; faith and healing; and knowledge and narrative.