Teaching Responsibility

LJMU Schools involved in Delivery:

Humanities and Social Science

Learning Methods

Lecture

Seminar

Tutorial

Module Offerings

5107SOC-JAN-MTP

Aims

Explore the contribution sociologists have made to the understanding of health and illness and processes of medicalisation, including the role of power and inequality.

Learning Outcomes

1.
Understand the social context of health and illness.
2.
Analyse competing theoretical perspectives in the sociology of health and illness.
3.
Evaluate the process of medicalization and its impact on everyday life.
4.
Analyse the ways that different bodies are medicalised, surveilled, controlled and differently valued through a variety of cultural processes.

Module Content

Outline Syllabus:• The social context of health • Sociological perspectives on health and illness • Medicine as social control • Medicalisation of everyday life • Power and patriarchy • Healthism and normalisation
Module Overview:
The first section of this module introduces you to the key areas in the sociology of health and illness, bringing together the contribution of different perspectives and methodological approaches which characterise sociological research in this area. It will allow you to understand the dominance of the biomedical model and how it has come to attempt to define experiences of health and illness. The second section will introduce you to the concept of medicalisation and we will use this lens to interrogate the ways in which bodies are 'othered', compartmentalised and differently treated. The related field of 'healthism' will further be explored and you will be challenged to consider the potential advantages and disadvantages of such processes in relation to the perceptions and treatment of certain bodies.
Additional Information:The first section of this module introduces the key areas in the sociology of health and illness, bringing together the contribution of different perspectives and methodological approaches which characterise sociological research in this area. It will allow you to understand the dominance of the biomedical model and how it has come to attempt to define wholly, experiences of health and illness. A sociological orientation will allow you to understand the importance of the social context in shaping the health of the nation. The second section will introduce the concept of medicalisation and use this lens to interrogate the ways in which bodies are ‘othered’, compartmentalized and differently treated. The related field of ‘healthism’ will further be explored and you will be challenged to consider the potential advantages and disadvantages of such processes in relation to the perceptions and treatment of certain bodies. We will use case studies of particular embodied experiences which will uncover the relationship some bodies have with nature, technology, society and structures that expose regimes of discipline, regulation, normalisation and surveillance. Students will have the opportunity to build on some of these themes at level 6 in modules Body Politics and Disability Studies.

Assessments

Presentation

Centralised Exam