SOC 371
Science, Technology, and (Bio)medicalization Spring 2015
Division II
Cross-listed SCST 371 / HSCI 371
This is not the current course catalog

Class Details

“Medicalization” is a term that appears with great frequency in historical and broadly social scientific studies of twentieth century American medicine. In brief, medicalization refers to those processes by which a myriad of previously {non}medical problems, once defined as ethical-religious, legal or social (e.g. drug and alcohol addition, shyness, obesity), are brought within the purview of medical science and redefined as medical problems, usually in terms of “illness” or “disorder”. We will begin the course by attending to the history of medicalization and its consequences. Taking guidance from key theoretical works and exemplary case studies, we will arrive at an understanding of medicalization as a {technical} process, and modern medicine as a quite potent form of {social control}. We will then move from a consideration of medicalization to biomedicalization; from the management of human life to transformations of “life itself” by way of post-World War II technoscientific interventions aimed at “optimizing” the vitality of individuals, groups, and entire populations. In particular, we will consider empirical case studies of technoscientific developments that have made possible the work of optimization that defines biomedicalization: molecular biology, pharmacogenomics, biotechnologies, imaging techniques (EEG, PET, and fMRI), robotics, and transplant medicine, among others. Finally, we will attend to how processes of biomedical optimization have produced new ways of seeing, knowing, and imagining human bodies, such that biology is increasingly less representative of “destiny” than it is of possibility. To this end, the course will conclude with a consideration of speculative technoscience and the ethics and politics of human enhancement.
The Class: Format: lecture
Limit: 25
Expected: 20-25
Class#: 3943
Grading: no pass/fail option, no fifth course option
Requirements/Evaluation: weekly discussion précis, science-fiction book review essay, class presentations, and a take-home midterm
Extra Info: may not be taken on a pass/fail basis; not available for the Gaudino option
Prerequisites: none
Enrollment Preferences: preference will be given to Anthropology and Sociology students
Distributions: Division II
Notes: This course is cross-listed and the prefixes carry the following divisional credit:
SOC 371 Division II SCST 371 Division II HSCI 371 Division II
Attributes: PHLH Bioethics + Interpretations of Health

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