© 2016 Olga Borisovna Khristoforova
2016 – №1 (11)
Key words: medical anthropology, elective course, author’s course, Center for Social Anthropology, syllabus, literature, video materials
Abstract: The course “Medical Anthropology” is intended for undergraduate students majoring in 46.03.03 “Anthropology and Ethnology”. This discipline is an elective course, it is offered to full-time students of the Center for Social Anthropology in the fourth year (7th semester).
The course lasts 72 hours (2 credit units), of which 32 hours are lectures and seminars, and 40 hours of self-study. The assessment depends on student’s performance during the seminars: discussions of the course literature, ethnographic films, key problems of the discipline. The assessment will be conducted through polls, colloquiums and anthropological assignments. Independent work consists in reading required materials.
Topic 1. Subject, methods, history of medical anthropology
The concept of medical anthropology as one of the sub-disciplines of social / cultural anthropology. The subject, methods and ideology of medical anthropology. The history of medical anthropology in foreign and domestic research traditions. The fundamental and applied nature of medical anthropology. Types of medical systems. Anthropology and global health.
Literature
Encyclopedia of Medical Anthropology: Health and Illness in the World’s Cultures / Ember C.R., Ember M. (eds). New York, 2004.
Helman C.G. Culture, health and illness: An introduction for health professionals. 3-rd ed. London, 2000.
Good B.J. Medicine, rationality and experience. Cambridge, 1994.
Medical anthropology: Health, healers and culture. New Delhi, 1998.
Kidder T. Behind the mountains-mountains. The history of the doctor who heals the whole world. M., 2015. (in Russian)
Mikhel D.V. Disease and World History: Textbook for undergraduate and students and students. Saratov, 2009. (in Russian)
Michel D.V. Medical anthropology: the history of discipline development: Textbook for students. Saratov, 2010. (in Russian)
Michel D.V. Social Anthropology of Medical Systems: Medical Anthropology: Textbook for students. Saratov, 2010. (in Russian)
Ozhiganova A.A. Anthropology and medicine: perspectives of interaction (discussion of 1980s – 2000s) // Ethnographic Review. 2011. № 3. P.10-21. (in Russian)
Yarskaya-Smirnova E., Grigorieva O. “We are part of nature …” social identification of folk healers // Journal of Sociology and Social Anthropology. 2006. T. IX. No. 1. P.151-170. (in Russian)
Kharitonova V.I. Medical anthropology in the West and in Russia // Ethnographic Review. 2011. № 3. P. 3-10. (in Russian)
Topic 2. Disease as a “cultural construct”
Disease vs. illness. “Cultural construction” of sickness. A variety of ideas about the bodily and mental norms and pathologies, hygiene, diseases and their treatment characteristic of certain ethnic and cultural communities.
Literature
Encyclopedia of Medical Anthropology: Health and Illness in the World’s Cultures / Ember C.R., Ember M. (eds). New York, 2004.
Hahn A. Sickness and healing: An anthropological perspective. New Haven, 1995.
Mattingly Ch., Carro L. (eds.) Narrative and the cultural construction of illness and healing. Univ. of California Press, 2000.
Douglas M. Purity and Danger. Analysis of the concepts of pollution and taboo. M., 2000. (Chapters 2, 3). (in Russian)
Ermakova EE, Povod NA. Traditions in folk hygiene and medicine of the Komi of the South of the Tyumen region // Bulletin of Archeology, Anthropology and Ethnography. 2007. № 7. (in Russian)
Trushkina N.Yu. Materials on folk medicine of the Ulyanovsk region // Zhivaya starina. 2001. № 1. P. 47-49. (in Russian)
Khristoforova О.B. “Fear and strain – vain death …” // Zhivaya starina. 2010. № 1. P. 49-51. (in Russian)
Khristoforova О.B. Earth, ice and eyes: notes to the mythology of the Nganasan // The power of the eye: the eyes in mythology and iconography / Ed. by D.I. Antonov. M., 2014. P. 147-172. (in Russian)
Theme 3. Traditions of healing among different ethnic and confessional groups
The traditions of healing among the peoples of Russia: the Eastern Slavs, the Ural and Altai peoples, Paleo-Asiatic and other peoples. Healing in Christian confessions (Catholicism, Protestantism, Orthodoxy). Traditional medicine in Islam and Buddhism. Tibetan medicine and its modern reception.
Literature
Encyclopedia of Medical Anthropology: Health and Illness in the World’s Cultures / Ember C.R., Ember M. (eds). New York, 2004.
Lindquist G. Conjuring Hope: Magic and Healing in Contemporary Russia. New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2006. 251 pp. (Series “Epistemologies of Healing”, Vol. 1.)
Danforth L.M. Firewalking and religious healing: The Anastenaria of Greece and the American firewalking movement. Princeton Univ. Press, 1989.
Ippolitova A.B. Russian hand-written herbariums of the XVII-XVIII centuries. Research of folklore and ethnobotany. M., 2008. (in Russian)
Kovalenko G. About traditional medicine in Pereyaslavsky district of Poltava province // Ethnographic review. 1891. № 2. P. 141-149. (in Russian)
Kukovyakin SA, Kukovyakina ND, Bratukhina OA Traditional medicine in Vyatka province. Kirov, 1997. (in Russian)
Mazalova N.E. Folk medicine of local groups of the Russian North // Russian North. St. Petersburg, 1995. (in Russian)
Melnikov A.P. On folk superstitions. Znahar medicine, divination and conspiracies in the Nizhny Novgorod region. Nizhny Novgorod, 1901. (in Russian)
Folk medicine. Selected materials (4 articles) // Zhivaya starina. 2007. № 3. P. 31-42. (in Russian)
Nikonova LI, Kandrina IA How peoples of the Volga region and the Urals were treated. Saransk, 2005. (in Russian)
Pashtova M.M. The text of the rite of the Chapsh: mythology, pragmatics, ethnocultural dialects / / Cross-cultural space of literary and mass communication: genesis and development. Materials of the international scientific conference. Maikop, 2012. P. 219-223. (in Russian)
Popov G. Russian folk medicine. Based on the materials of the ethnographic bureau of Prince VN. Tenisheva. St. Petersburg., 1903. (in Russian)
Sidorov AS Witchcraft, sorcery and evil eye among the people of Komi: Materials on the psychology of witchcraft. Leningrad, 1928. (Reprint: St. Petersburg, 1997). (in Russian)
Toren MD Russian folk medicine and psychotherapy. St. Petersburg, 1996. (reprint: M. Toran, Why do Russians live long, applying traditional medicine? St. Petersburg, 2014)
Hakkarainen MV Local concepts of diseases and treatment (Markovo village, Chukotka). Diss. … Ph.D. SPb., 2005.
Theme 4. Medical systems of the “traditional type”
Characteristics of medical systems of the “traditional type”. Disease as a “special case of unhappiness.” Vernacular theories of disease (J. Murdoch). “Voodoo death” (M. Mauss, W. Cannon). Concepts that explain faith in witchcraft.
Literature
Cannon W.B. Voodoo death // American Anthropologist. 1942. Vol. 44. P. 169-181.
Evans-Pritchard E.E. Witchcraft, oracles and magic among the Azande. Oxford, 1937.
Murdock G.P. Theories of illness: A world survey. Univ. of Pittsburgh Press, 1980.
Whyte S.R. Questioning misfortune: The pragmatics of uncertainty in eastern Uganda. Cambridge, 1998.
Arnautova Yu.E. Sorcerers and Saints: The Anthropology of Disease in the Middle Ages. SPb., 2004. (in Russian)
Mauss M. The physical effect on the individual of the idea of death suggested by the collectivity // Moss M. Society. Exchange. Personality: Works on social anthropology. M., 1996. (in Russian)
Levi-Strauss K. Structural anthropology. M., 1984. (Section “Magic and Religion”, chapters 9, 10). (in Russian)
Nechaeva L.S. The image of the disease in traditional culture (on the basis of the lexicon of the Perm dialects) // Bulletin of Perm University. 2010. № 1 (17). Pp. 12-20. (in Russian)
Khristoforova О.B. Sorcerers and victims: Anthropology of witchcraft in modern Russia. M., 2010. (Chapter 1). (in Russian)
Theme 5. Mechanisms of symbolic treatment
Ritual as a space of healing. The nature of the relationship “healer-patient-social environment.” Symbolic healing and its social, psychological and biological mechanisms. The effects of placebo and nocebo. An incantation text (zagovor) in light of semiotics.
Literature
Levi-Strauss K. Structural anthropology. M., 1984. (Section “Magic and Religion”, chapters 9, 10). (in Russian)
Austin JL Word as action // New in foreign linguistics. Issue. XVII. M., 1986. (in Russian)
Poznansky N. Plots: Experience in the study of the origin and development of incantation formulas. M., 1995. (in Russian)
Publicuk E., Toporkov A. Znaharka from Andoma and her incantations // Folk medicine and magic in the Slavic and Jewish cultural traditions. Collection of articles / Ed. O.V. Belova. M., 2007. S. 188-204. (in Russian)
Chuyrovrov A. “Driving off the disease” in the therapeutic and prophylactic rites of the Komi-Zyryans: word and ritual // Folk medicine and magic in the Slavic and Jewish cultural traditions. M., 2007. P. 221-233. (in Russian)
Hakkarainen MV Ritual treatment in the context of the symbolic values of the local community // Anthropology. Folklore. Linguistics: Collection of articles. St. Petersburg, 2002. Issue. 2. P. 263-284. (in Russian)
Theme 6. Anthropology of mental health
The concepts of “anthropological / cultural psychiatry” and “ethnopsychiatry”. Ethnocultural ideas about the mental norm and pathology. Culture-bound syndromes as “intermediate” types between universal and local, norm and pathology. Examples of cultural-bound syndromes (amok, wihtigo, piblokto, latah, hiccups, etc.). Local interpretation of CBS, methods of their treatment and ways of institutionalization. Trance and obsession. Shamanic trance – an expression of mental pathology or a healing method? Cults of obsession – a way of isolating “pathology” or a social institution with several important functions?
Literature
Encyclopedia of Medical Anthropology: Health and Illness in the World’s Cultures / Ember C.R., Ember M. (eds). New York, 2004.
Kleinman A.K. Patients and healers in the context of culture: An exploration of the borderland between anthropology, medicine, and psychiatry. Berkeley; London: University of California Press, 1980.
Littlewood R. Cultural psychiatry and medical anthropology: An introduction and reader. New Brunswick, N.J., 2000.
Simons R. C., Hughes C.C. The culture-bound syndromes: Folk illnesses of psychiatric and anthropological interest. Dordrecht; Lancaster: Reidel, 1985.
Arsenova E.V. East-Slavic traditional notions of “special” knowledge and disease // Anthropology. Folklore. Linguistics: Collection of articles. St. Petersburg, 2002. Issue. 2. P. 4-22. (in Russian)
Barnard A. Traditional medicine and medicine men in the Bushmen of the people // The space of witchcraft / Comp. O.B. Khristoforova; Ed. S.Yu. Neklyudov. M., 2010. P. 60-83. (in Russian)
Makarova V.Yu. Priest and patient (based on the materials of the second half of the XIX – early XX centuries) // Anthropology. Folklore. Linguistics: Collection of articles. St. Petersburg, 2002. Issue 2. P. 131-169. (in Russian)
Melekhov D.E. Psychiatry and problems of spiritual life // Psychiatry and actual problems of spiritual life. M., 2003.
Melnikova E.A. Otchityvanie of the possessed: practices and discourses / / Anthropological forum. 2006. № 4. P. 220-263.
Nechaeva L.S. Names and characteristics of people with mental diseases: the motivational aspect (based on the Russian dialects of the Perm Territory) // Bulletin of Perm University. 2014. No. 2 (26). Pp. 32-43. (in Russian)
Novik ES, Khristoforova OB Visual images of the world in Siberian shamanism // Spatial models of traditional cultures [Interactive training program]. Moscow: RGGU, 2004. http://goo.gl/e1XmIW
Khristoforova О.B. Obsession in the Russian countryside. M., 2016. P. 116-165. (in Russian)
Khristoforova О.B. Receiving the gift (stories about the shamanic becoming of the Nganasan) // Arbor mundi. International Journal of Theory and History of World Culture. Issue. 10. 2003. P. 87-105. (in Russian)
Smolyak A.V. Shaman: personality, function, worldview. M., 1991. (in Russian)
Topic 7. Medicine of the “Western” type
Sociocultural aspects of production of medical knowledge. Emergence of “biomedicine” / “hospital” medicine / medicine of the “Western” type, and its features. M. Foucault and the history of “Western” psychiatry.
Literature
MacDonald M. Mystical Bedlam: Madness, Anxiety, and Healing in Seventeenth-Century England. N.Y .: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1981.
Good B.J. Medicine, rationality and experience. Cambridge, 1994.
Bogdanov K.A. Doctors, patients, readers. Pathographic texts of Russian culture of the XVIII – XIX centuries (Series: Nation and Culture, New Studies). M., 2005. (in Russian)
Homo medicus. Hippocrates of the Stone Age. Part I. [Electronic resource]. URL:
http://22century.ru/popular-science-publications/homo-medicus1 (in Russian)
Homo medicus. Hippocrates of the Stone Age. Part II. [Electronic resource]. URL: http://home-medic.com (in Russian)
Mikhel D.V. Medical anthropology: history of discipline development: Textbook for stud. Saratov, 2010.
Mikhel D.V. Folk culture in the focus of sanitary and medical perception in the context of the fight against epidemics on the Volga at the turn of the XIX and XX centuries. [Electronic resource]. URL: http://www.countries.ru/library/antropology/ncv.htm (in Russian)
Novombergsky N.Ya. Materials on the history of medicine in Russia. T. I-IV. St. Petersburg, 1906-1907. (in Russian)
Russian literature and medicine: Body, injunctions, social practice: Sat. articles / Ed. K.A. Bogdanov, Yu Murashov, R. Nikolosi. M., 2006. (in Russian)
Foucault M. Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. SPb., 1997. (in Russian)
Foucault M. The birth of the clinic. M., 1998. (in Russian)
Topic 8. Medicine and contemporary urban culture
The culture of health workers. “Hospital” subculture. Types of “non-traditional medicine” in contemporary urban culture. Vernacular conceptions of diseases, practices of diagnosis and healing. Medical pluralism or medical syncretism?
Literature
Our reader is Protopriest Igor Vostrikov about homeopathy: “God heals, but we are only His tools” / / Homeopathic book. 10/04/2016. [Electronic resource]. URL: http://www.homeobooks.ru/blog/post/6312.html
Modern urban folklore / Ed. A.F. Belousov, I.S. Veselova, S.Yu. Neklyudov. M., 2003. (in Russian)
Kharitonova VI, Ozhiganova AA, Kupryashina NA In search of spirituality and health: new religious movements, neo-shamanism, urban shamanism. M., 2008 (Studies on Applied and Urgent Ethnology, No. 207). (in Russian)
Yarskaya-Smirnova E., Grigorieva O. “We are part of nature …” social identification of folk healers // Journal of Sociology and Social Anthropology. 2006. T. IX. No. 1. P.151-170. (in Russian)