Medicine & Society
The Medicine & Society Program is an exciting opportunity for undergraduate students in Arts & Sciences who are interested in exploring the interface of culture, behavior and health from a social science perspective. The program addresses the important social and cultural foundations of health and illness in human societies, with a specific emphasis on service, research, and mentoring opportunities. In addition to the academic activities, Medicine & Society has a robust sense of community with several opportunities to work with, spend time with, and serve with other Medicine & Society Scholars.
The Medicine & Society program is supported by a grant from the Danforth Foundation and administered through the Department of Anthropology. It is not a major/minor program; it is a four-year program that is available by application only.
Eligibility
The Medicine & Society Program is a four-year program designed for matriculating first-year students. Admission to this program is highly competitive. Academic credentials, aptitude and interest in a health-related career, and personal statements all will be considered when selecting up to 20 participants to join the entering cohort. The program will particularly appeal to students with a long-term commitment to careers and research in healthcare and related fields. All evaluations for admission into this program are blind.
Curriculum
The Medicine & Society Program has its intellectual and programmatic roots in the field of medical anthropology, which is broadly defined as the study of human health and illness across culture, time and space. Medical anthropologists examine the role of culture and society in the shaping of illness experiences. Foci of inquiry may include such issues as traditional health beliefs and practices; cultural clashes between traditional medicine and biomedicine; political and economic foundations of health disparities; ethical considerations pertaining to health care research, access, and the experience of care and illness; alternative and complementary medicine; social and behavioral factors that affect disease rates; and public health responses to emerging health problems. These topics all share a focus on community as a primary area of inquiry and population as a primary unit of analysis.
Requirements
Once admitted to the program, students must complete the following during the 4-year period of their undergraduate careers (Total of 18 credit hours) the table lists required courses, the information below it provides information about additional program requirements:
| Code | Title | Units |
|---|---|---|
| ANTHRO 1141 | Ampersand: Medicine and Society | 3 |
| ANTHRO 1142 | Ampersand: Medicine and Society | 3 |
| ANTHRO 3423 | Health and Wellness in the Community: A Service Learning Seminar | 4 |
| ANTHRO 4423 | Advanced Seminar in Medicine and Society: Patients, Politics, Policy | 3 |
- First-year Medicine & Society year-long seminar (1141*, 1142*)
- Community health internship or service-learning course (3423*)
- A major or minor in anthropology
- A junior/senior advanced seminar addressing contemporary issues in Medicine & Society (4423)
- 2 additional Medical Anthropology electives.
- Sample elective courses offered in Medical Anthropology can be found here: Global Health and the Environment
- The W.H.R Rivers Project, which is a final project, paper, capstone, or honors thesis conducted during their senior year. All students will present these projects during the spring semester of their senior year at the W.H.R Rivers Showcase.
Students who are accepted into the Medicine & Society Program are enrolled in a year-long first-year seminar on culture, health and society in the Department of Anthropology. This seminar provides the academic foundation for future community health work in St. Louis. Beginning as early as the sophomore year, students identify and select a community health site for internship placement or service-learning activities. The internship/service-learning opportunity provides students with a location for focusing their interest and involvement in community health and allows them to participate in the work of the host organization. During the junior and senior years, students have the opportunity to intensify their academic and service activities at the internship or service-learning site, which may culminate in a senior honors thesis or a capstone project based on original research and investigation. Students in the Medicine & Society Program are encouraged to graduate with honors, based on their independent research and academic achievement.
- *
Please note that, with the transition to Workday, course numbers will/may be shifting.
Personnel
The Medicine & Society Program is directed by Dr. Anna Jacobsen, a sociocultural and medical anthropologist whose previous work discussed issues pertaining to religion and morality as they influence perspectives and understandings of personhood and mental and spiritual health. Her current work explores end of life spaces of care, including hospice and palliative care. She is interested in how individual and intersubjective personhood is constructed and engaged with by the individual, their loved ones, and the care team, with a particular attention to the temporal space that is coded as simultaneously urgent and protracted. Included in her work are individuals whose diagnoses and prognoses shift to where individuals occupy a space of being that is chronically terminal. This impacts not only how care is administered but importantly how the chronically terminal person experiences and performs themselves, their care, and is treated by others.
The Medicine & Society Program's Assistant Director is A.J. Jones, a medical and psychological anthropologist. In her research, Dr. Jones is broadly interested in developing accessible and creative ethnographic methods to explore experiences of disability and queerness in medicine. Her previous work on the genetic condition Turner Syndrome centered a series of rehearsals and original, co-written plays to share her interlocutors' experiences with disability, infertility, and gender and sex identity. She is currently working with geneticists at WashU to develop visual aids to facilitate public engagement with increasingly individualized, dynamic, and mosaic chromosomal information. Her upcoming project will investigate how asexual and aromantic folks in the St. Louis area conceptualize intimacy and citizenship through a series of multimodal workshops.
Erin Coleman, the Medicine & Society Program Administrator, is also the Administrative Coordinator for the Undergraduate Program in the Department of Anthropology as well as the Study Abroad Coordinator for the Anthropology department. She has a background in cultural anthropology and international studies as well as extensive experience in community organizing and direct service within nonprofit organizations in the St. Lous are.
Students should also be aware that they also have full access to other faculty in anthropology and related disciplines who offer courses of relevance and interest.
Contact Info
| Contact: | Dr. Anna Jacobsen |
| Email: | aljacobs@wustl.edu |
| Website: | https://anthropology.wustl.edu/medicine-society-program |