HEALTH AND SOCIETIES
(AS) {HSOC}  

L/R 001. (STSC001) Emergence of Modern Science. (A) May be counted toward the Hum/SocSci or NatSci/Math Sectors. Class of 2010. Adams.

Examines the emergence and development of the scientific world view, from the Renaissance to the end of the 20th century.  Explores the history of scientific ideas, the social contexts which gave rise to them, and their social and human implications.  Sample topics include: Copernican revolution; Galileo, science and the Church; Newton and the mechanical worldview; Enlightenment and Romantic science; Lavoisier, industrialization and the rise of modern chemistry; Darwin; Darwinism and evolution; atomic physics, the bomb and its aftermath; the emergence of modern genetics; the DNA revolution; computers on the information age; and science and the human future.

L/R 002. (HIST036, STSC002) Medicine in History. (C) History & Tradition Sector. All classes. Barnes.

This course surveys the history of medical knowledge and practice from ancient times to the present.  No prior background in the history of science or medicine is required.  The course has two principal goals (1) to give students a practical introduction to the fundamental questions and methods of the history of medicine and (2)to foster a nuanced, critical understanding of medicine's complex role in contemporary society.  The course takes a broadly chronological approach, blending the perspectives of tha patient, the physician and society as a whole--recognizing that medicine has always aspired to "treat" healthy people as well as the sick and infirm.  Rather than history "from the top down" or "from the bottom up," this course sets its sights on history from the inside out.  This means, first, that medical knowledge and practice is understood through the personal experiences of patients and caregivers.  It also means that lectures and discussions will take the long-dicredited knowledge and treatments of the past seriously, on their own terms, rather than judging them by today's standards.  Required readings consist largely of primary sources, from elite medical texts to patient diaries.  Short research assignments will encourage students to adopt the perspectives of a range of actors in various historical eras.

L/R 003. (STSC003) Technology and Society. (C) Society Sector. All classes. Cowan/Ensmenger.

"We shape our technolgies; thereafter they shape us." This course surveys the ways in which technology has shaped our societies and our relations with the natural world.  We will examine the origins and impact of technical developments throughout human history and across the globe--from stone tools, agriculture and cave painting to ancient cities, metallurgy and aqueducts; from windmills, cathedrals, steam engines and electricity to atom bombs, the internet and genetic engineering.  We will pay attention to the aesthetic, religious and mythical dimensions of technological change and consider the circumstances in which innovations emerge and their effects on social order, on the environment and on the ways humans understand themselves.

L/R 010. (STSC010) Health and Societies. (C) Humanities & Social Science Sector. Class of 2010 & beyond. Barnes. Also fulfills General Requirement in Science Studies for Class of 2009 and prior.

This course is an introduction to the vocabulary, skills, and concepts basic to sociocultural studies of health and disease.  While recognizing the importance of the biomedical model, particularly to Western civilization, the course asks students to explore other approaches and healing traditions.  It does so by exploring how policy analysts, medical care providers, and scholars from a variety of disciplines including anthropology, history and sociology have crafted responses to such real world problems as malnutrition, epidemic disease, and the inequitable distribution of health resources.

L/R 011. (STSC160) The History of the Information Age. (C) Humanities & Social Science Sector. Class of 2010 & beyond. Ensmenger.

Certain new technologies are greeted with claims that, for good or ill, they must transform our society.  The two most recent: the computer and the Internet.  But the series of social, economic, and technological developments that underlie what is often called the "Information Revolution" include much more than just the computer.  In this course, we explore the history of informtion technology and its role in contemporary society.  We will explore both the technologies themselves--from telephones to computers to video games--as well as their larger social, economic and political context.  To understand the roots of these ideas we look at the pre-history of the comptuer, at the idea of the "post industrial" or "information society," at parallels with earlier technolgies and at broad currents in the development of American society.

SM 018. (STSC046) Medicine in Africa. (A) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Feierman.

The story of health, healing and disease on the African continent in its historical context.  What is the relationship between the growth of cities and the spread of AIDS, or between globalization and malnutrition?  Is biomedicine practiced on the African continent the same way it is in the U.S., or are there important differences?  What are the major African healing traditions, and how do they work?  What are the forces, in our world today, that lead to malnutrition and disease in Africa, or to health and well-being?

SM 025. (FOLK025, HIST025, RELS116, STSC028) Western Science, Magic and Religion 1600 to the present. (C) History & Tradition Sector. All classes. Kuklick.

Throughout human history, the relationships of science and religion, as well as of science and magic, have been complex and often surprising.  This course will cover topics ranging from the links between magic and science in the seventeenth century to contemporary anti-science movements.

SM 039. The Healer's Tale: Negotiating Trust in Modern America. (C) Tighe.

Dramatic, deadly, and terrifying in their brutal immediacy, outbreaks of epidemic disease have devastated and transformed human societies since the beginnings of recorded history.  From the Black Death to cholera to AIDS, epidemics have wrought profound demographic, social, political and cultural change all over the world.  Such is the power of their mystery and horror that while thousands die everyday in the United States from mundane illnesses such as heart disese or lung cancer, panic grips the land at the thought of a handful of deaths from seemingly exotic affictions such as West Nile encephalitis and "weaponized" anthrax.  Through a detailed analysis of specific historical outbreaks, this seminar will investigate the causes and effects of epidemic disease, and will examine the ways in which different societies in different eras have responded in times of crisis.

SM 048. Epidemics in History. (C) Barnes.

Dramatic, deadly, and terrifying in their brutal immediacy, outbreaks of epidemic disease have devastated and transformed human societies since the beginnings of recorded history.  From the Black Death to cholera to AIDS, epidemics have wrought profound demographic, social, political and cultural change all over the world.  Such is the power of their mystery and horror that while thousands die everyday in the United States from mundane illnesses such as heart disese or lung cancer, panic grips the land at the thought of a handful of deaths from seemingly exotic affictions such as West Nile encephalitis and "weaponized" anthrax.  Through a detailed analysis of specific historical outbreaks, this seminar will investigate the causes and effects of epidemic disease, and will examine the ways in which different societies in different eras have responded in times of crisis.

SM 050. (STSC059) Mad, Bad and Sad: The Construction, Prevention and Treatment of Mental Illness. (C) Mandell.

This freshmen seminar is designed to introduce students to research and debatessurrounding the concept of mental disorder and to help them to think critically about these disorders' biological and social construction.  In addition to learning about the presentation and treatment of mental illness, they weill also be introduced to concepts in epidemiology, psychology, psychiatry and health services research, and learn about the history of the science surrounding psychiatry and how different beliefs at different times have influended policy, systems, services and treatment.

SM 058. What is Cancer?  Disease, Society, History. (M) Aronowitz.

What is cancer?  Wht causes cancer?  What do its high prevalence and devastating effects tell us about ourselves and our society?  What can we do about it?  Laboratory researchers, epidemiologists, public health officials, medical specialists, environmental activists, and cancer patients have offered different and incomplete answers to such questions.  Students will learn about these difference perspectives by analyzing historical documents and scholarship from different disciplines and professions, meeting with health professionals and others, and doing writing and research assignments.

100. (SOCI100) Introduction to Sociological Research. (C) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Staff.

This course surveys the different sociological methods, including: survey, content analysis, historical-comparative, participant observation and ethnographic perspectives.  It reviews research design, experimental design, evaluation methods, research ethics and the uses of research.  Students explore these methods and perspectives in class assignments and exercices.  A brief introduction to SPSS (statistical package for the social sciences) is also provided.

L/R 101. (PHIL072, PPE 072) Biomedical Ethics. (M) Lindee.

A survey of moral problems in medicine and biomedical research.  Problems discussed include: genetic manipulation, informed consent, infanticide, abortion, euthanasia, and the allocation of medical resources.  Moral theory is presented with the aim of enabling students to think critically and analytically about moral issues.  The need for setting biomedical issues in broader humanistic perspective is stressed.

SM 109. (SAST286, GSOC108) Topics in Health in South Asia. (L) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Sheehan.

Drawing upon theoretical and empirical evidence, the course uses a socio-medical approach for understanding the health status and health behaviors of women in South Asia.  Gender is a crucial explanatory variable of women's survival experience; burden of disease; nutritional status; and access to and utilization of health services.  Girls and women face health and disease problems over their life course related to nutrition needs, reproductive health, work conditions, as well as to infectionous disease. This course places the experience of women's health in South Asia in contemporary, historic, and comparative frameworks.  Lectures, discussion, and assignments provide entry to greater understanding of both the specialized nature of South Asian women's health problems, as well as those common to women worldwide.

111. (SOCI111, STSC151) Health of Populations. (C) Preston.

This course develops some of the major measures used to assess the health of populations and uses those measures to consider the major factors that determine levels of health in large aggregates.  These factors include disease environment, medical technology, public health initiatives, and personal behaviors.  The approach is comparative and historical and includes attention to differences in health levels among major social groups.

118. (SOCI118) Sociology of Bioethics. (A) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Wolpe.

The Sociology of Bioethics explores the sociological approach to bioethics. The Sociology of Bioethics is not a course in bioethics itself; rather than discussing the merits of a position (Is assisted suicide ethical?), we will ask how the debate has been framed, who is promoting which arguments, why the debate has arisen now, and how the issue is reflected in policy.  In order to do so we will make use of social science research, along with philosophical treatises, legislation, and the popular media.  The course is also not designed as a comprehensive treatment of the field; it will focus instead on choice topics that we will explore in depth.  Our goal is to understand the nature of the bioethics profession and its modes of argumentation, and to explore the cultural, social, political, and professional underpinnings of bioethical debates.

SM 135. (PSCI135) The Politics of Food. (M) Summers.

This academically based community service seminar will explore the many different politics that shape food production and consuption and problems like food insecurity and obesity here in West Philadelphia and around the world. Students will be encouraged to think broadly about how people engage in politics --articulate goals, form alliances, struggle for power, respond to and engage in leadership- in many different areas: cities, farms, factories, kitchens, markets, schools, churches, research institutions, social movements, elections, legislatures.  A focus on case studies of leaders who have made a difference in the politics of food will include guest speakers, who work on food related issues.

L/R 140. (STSC148) History of Bioethics. (C) Linker.

This course is an introduction to the historical development of medical ethics and to the birth of bioethics in the twentieth-century United States.  We will examine how and why medical ethical issues arose in American society at this time.  Themes will include human experimentation, organ donation, the rise of medical technology and euthanasia.  Finally, this course will examine the contention that the current discipline of bioethics is a purely American phenomenon that has been exported to Great Britain, Canada and Continental Europe.

L/R 145. (FOLK145, HIST146, STSC145) Comparative Medicine. (C) Distribution Course in Hist & Tradition. Class of 2009 & prior only. Feierman.

This course focuses on health and healing in the colonial and post-colonial world.  We give special attention to local healing under condition of domination, to definitions of the body and the person in biomedicine and in non-European healing traditions, and to th epolitical and cultural place of medicine in regions which have experienced colonial rule.

L/R 150. (SOCI152, STSC142) American Health Policy. (M) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Linker.

This lecture course will introduce students to a broad range of topics that fall under the heading of American health policy.  Its main emphasis will be on the history of health care in America from the U.S.  Civil War to the present day.  Some of the themes addressed include: American public health movements and hospitals, private health insurance (such as Blue Cross/Blue Shield),industrial health and workmen's compensation, the welfare state (in Europe and the U.S.), women's health, especially maternal and infant care programs, Medicare/Medicaid, the Clinton Health Plan, injured soldiers and the Veterans Administration.

152. (STSC162) Technology and Medicine in Modern America. (L) Staff.

Medicine as it exists in contemporary America is profoundly technological; we regard it as perfectly normal to be examined with instruments, to expose our bodies to many different machines; and to have knowledge produced by those machines mechanically/electronically processed, interpreted and stored.  We are billed technolgoically, prompted to attend appointments technologically, and often buy technologies to protect, diagnose, or improve our health: consider, for example, HEPA-filtering vacum cleaners; air-purifiers; fat-reducing grills; bathroom scales; blood pressure cuffs; pregancy testing kits; blood-sugar monitoring tests; and thermometers.  Yet even at the beginning to the twentieth century, medical technolgies were scarce and infrequently used by physicians and medical consumers alike.  Over the course of this semester, we will examine how technology came to medicine's center-stage, and what impact this change has had on medical practice, medical institutions and medical consumers - on all of us!

L/R 154. (ANTH154) The Medical Anthropology of Alcohol Use. (M) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Chrzan.

The morality, rights, and responsibilities of alcohol use are hotly debated in the United States.  The rhetoric of appropriate use ranges from Puritan-inspired abstinence campaigns, through health-promoting moderation arguments, to discourses legitimizing hedonism.  The result of a lack of cleary cultural paradigms for intoxicant use is clearly seen on college campuses, where movements for zero-tolerance alcohol bans coexist with social rituals that include binge drinking.  This course will utilize medical anthropology theory to: 1) contextualize the phenomenon historically and cross-culturally; 2) encourage students to critically analyze existing paradigms which determine acceptable usage and treatment modalities; 3) use the University of Pennsylvania campus as a local case study/field site to investigate alcohol use.  Students will move from theory to action through creation of a feasible proposal addressing alcohol-use education on Penn's campus, or will participate in the modification and implementation of existing proposals to promote rational and low-risk use of alcohol i the college community.

SM 170. (CLST170, STSC245) Ancient Greek Medicine. (M) Distribution Course in Hist & Tradition. Class of 2009 & prior only. Rosen.

The history of modern medicine as we know it in the West is remarkably recent; until the nineteenth century prevailing theories of the body and mind, and the many therapeutic methods to combat disease, were largely informed by an elaborate system developed centuries earlier in ancient Greece, at a period when the lines between philosophy, medicine, and what we might consider magic, were much less clearly defined than they are today.  This course will examine the ways in which the Greeks conceptualized the body, disease, and healing, and will compare these to medical culture of our own time.  We will consider sources from Hippocrates, Plato, and Aristotle to Galen and Soranus, and whenever possible we will juxtapose these writings with modern discourse about similar topics.  Several visitors from the Medical School are expected to participate on a regular basis.  All readings will be in English and no previous background in Classical Studies is required.

SM 179. (HIST320, STSC179) Environmental History. (B) Distribution Course in Hist & Tradition. Class of 2009 & prior only. Greene.

Environmental history studies the interactions between humans and the natural world.  In this kind of study, mosquitoes and rain are actors in history as well as humans and their impact.  This course explores these interactions through case studies and topics nationally and globally, such as energy, disease, human migration and settlement, animals, technological changes, urban and suburban development, conservation and politics.  This course is geared toward students who want to think about how history happens, in different places and over time.

L/R 200. (ENVS200) Introduction to Environmental Analysis. (C) Giegengack.

An introduction to philosophy, techniques, and selected details of the application of a broad spectrum of disciplines that relate to environmental problems.

202. (STSC202) The Scientific Revolution. (M) Staff.

The emergence of science in the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries as an activity that remade ideas of nature and society, that created new professions and institutions, and that ultimately transformed human consciousness. Classical approaches to science, challenges and new departures, the mutation of research inside and outside universities, new patterns in the dissemination of science and in public response.

SM 204. (HIST203) Major Seminar in History: America Before 1800. (C) Staff.

206. (STSC247) Health and Disease in the Developing World. (C) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Staff.

This course will explore the current context of health policy, health reform, and health service delivery in the developing world.  After examining global economic and political context of health care, students will analyze the role that economic development plays in promoting or undermining health.  Students will examine key disease challenges such as tuberculosis, malnutrition, and HIV/AIDS.

L/R 212. (STSC112) Science Technology & War. (C) Distribution Course in Hist & Tradition. Class of 2009 & prior only. Lindee.

In this survey we explore the relationships between technical knowledge and warin the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.  We attend particularly to the centrality of bodily injury in the history of war.  Topics include changing interpretations of the machine gun as inhumane or acceptable; the cult of the battleship; banned weaponry; submarines and masculinity; industrialized war and total war; trench warfare and mental breakdown; the atomic bomb and Cold War; chemical warfare in Viet Nam; and "television war" in the 1990s.

SM 213. (STSC260) Cyberculture. (M) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Ensmenger.

Free speech, free software, MOOS, MUDs, anime and cyberpunk.  All of these are elements of a braod set of social, technical and political phenomena associated with the emergence of a nascent "cyberculture".  In this seminar we explore the ways in which recent developments in information technology -- the computer and the Internet in particular -- relat to changing contemporary notions of community, identity, property and gender.  By looking at an eclectic collection of popular and scholarsly resources including film, fiction and the World Wide Web, we will situate the development of "cyberculture" into the larger history of the complex relationship between technology and Western society.

SM 216. (STSC248, GSOC325) Women and Health. (M) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Staff.

This course introduces students to anthropological and sociological perspectives on the intersection of gender and health.  In the course we will examine several theoretical approaches to women and health, such as feminist and political economic perspectives.  We will explore key women's health issues such as experiences with the medical establishment, health disparities along lines of race and class, reprodutive health, reproductive rights, body image and women's experiences with HIV/AIDS.  These issues will be explored in the context of the United States and developing countries.

SM 230. Fundamentals of Epidemiology. (B) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Kanetsky.

This course introduces students to the basic tenets of epidemiology and how to quantitatively study health at the population level.  Students learn about measures used to describe populations with respect to health outcomes and the inherent limitations in these measures and their underlying sources of data. Analytic methods used to test scientific questions about health outcomes in populations then are covered, again paying particular attention to the strength and weaknesses of the various approaches.

L/R 238. (ANTH238) Medical Anthropology. (C) Barg.

Introduction to medical anthropology takes central concepts in anthropology -- culture, adaptation, human variation, belief, political economy, the body -- and applies them to human health and illness.  Students explore key elements of healing systems including healing technologies and healer-patient relationships.  Modern day applications for medical anthropology are stressed.

SM 250. (STSC249) Social History of Mental Illness. (M) Tighe.

This course will explore the history of mental illness in the United States, from the eighteenth century to the present.  It will focus on a set of questions: to what extent is mental illness socially constructed?  How does society arrive at its concepts of and attitudes towards both emotional and behavioral disturbance as well as notions of adjustment and normality?  The asylum movement of the nineteenth century, the rise of psychiatry as a medical specialty, the role of the media and lay public in shaping its identity, legal issues such as commitment and competence, as well as the development of psychopharmacology & an increasingly biologically based psychiatry in the twentieth century will be examined.

252. (STSC240) Law and Medicine. (C) Staff.

This course is intended to give students an in-depth understanding of the ways in which medical practice and medical decision-making are guided by modern American law.  Students will learn how the law's regulatory powers have been used to set boundaries in medicine and, in turn, how medical practice and theory have informed modern legal develoments.  The field of health care law sits at a crossroads where many of life's "big questions" converge, and consequently is shaped, more than any other legal discipline, by social, ethical, cultural and economic influences.  By the end of this course, students should have an understanding both of the current state of American health law, and of the social forces that have shaped its historical development.

273. (SOCI273) Law, Medicine, and Public Policy. (B) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Bosk.

First the course will develop a persepctive for viewing social problems drawn largely on my own work as well as that of Gusfelds and Edelman.  Next we will explore the domains to which a physician's expertise is limited using Weber, Rosenberg and others.  We will then develop a perspective from anthropological and sociological literature on the courts as public arenas for articulating Durkheimian collective conscience.  All of this theory building is in the firsthalf of the seminar.  The second half of the course will involve intensive case study of a few dilemmas which have wended their way through the courts.  I intend to look at "Baby Doe Regulations" and the Intensive Care Nursery; the problem of the cessation of life-supporting treatment; the legitimacy of mass screen - be it for genetic defects or substance abuse; and the propriety of surrogate motherhood.

275. (SOCI275) Medical Sociology. (C) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Schnittker.

This course is designed to give the student a general introduction to the sociological study of medicine.  Medical sociology is a broad field, covering topics as diverse as the institution and profession of medicine, the practice of medical care, and the social factors that contribute to sickness and well-being.  While we will not cover everything, we will attempt to cover as much of the field as possible through four central thematic units: (1) the organization of development of the profession of medicine, (2) the delivery of health-care, (3) social cultural factors in defining health, and (4) the social causes of illness.  Throughout the course, our discussions will be designed to understand the sociological perspective and encourage the application of such a perspective to a variety of contemporary medical issues.

SM 305. (SAST285, SAST335, SAST635) Health and Society in South Asia. (M) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Sheehan.

The countries of South Asia have traditional medical systems like Ayurveda and Unani, major public health traditions and problems, as well as the global isses of health delivery and costs for aging populations, in addition to changing threats like HIV.  Health service delivery is highly uneven by income and education group as well as by gender and region, and is heavily conditioned by the cultures of the area which influence attitudes to preventive measures like nutrition and hygiene.  This course provides an overview of these issues.

SM 310. (ANTH310) Anthropology and Biomedical Science. (M) Staff.

An examination of the role of anthropology in biomedical research, focusing upon health and disease as outcomes of biocultural systems.  Where possible, students will engage in collection and analysis of data and the dissemination of the results.

SM 312. (STSC312) Weapons of Mass Destruction. (C) Lindee.

The course explores the historical development of traditional weapons of mass destcruction such as chemical, nuclear and biological agents, in addition to newer and seemingly non-traditional weapons such as land mines and civilian aircraft that can also be employed to cause large numbers of injuries and deaths among civilian and military populations.  Through case studies in technology and public health, students will evaluate the medical, scientific, environmental, and cultural ramifications of these weapons and their effect on human heal and society by analyzing the rise of the military-industrial-academic-complex in twentieth century America.

SM 321. (ANTH312, URBS312) Health in Urban Communities. (A) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Staff.

This course will introduce students to anthropological approaches to health and to theories of participatory action research.  This combined theoretical perspective will then be put into practice using West Philadelphia community schools as a case study.  Students will become involved in design and implementation of health-related projects at an urban elementary or middle school.  As one of the course requirements, students will be expected to produce a detailed research proposal for future implementation.

SM 331. (STSC339) Genes, Medicine and Politics. (C) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Cowan.

This course explores how human heredity has been scientifically constructed as a political resource.  Topics include the rise of eugenics movements around the world, the role of genetics in scientific racism, the social meaning of genetic disease, and the development of the human genome project.

SM 335. (PSCI335) Healthy Schools. (M) Summers.

This academically based community service research seminar will develop a pilot program to test the efficacy of using service-learning teams of undergraduates and graduate students to facilitate the development of School Health Councils (SHCs) and the Center for Disease Control's School Health Index (SHI) school self-assessment and planning tool in two elementary schools in West Philadelphia.  This process is intended to result in a realistic and meaningful school health implimentation plan and an ongoing action project to put this plan into practice.  Penn students will involve member sof the school administration, teachers, staff, parents and ocmmunity member sin the SHC and SHI process iwth a special focus on encouraging participation from the schools' students.  In this model for the use of Penn service-learning teams is successful, it will form the basis of on ongoing partnership with the School District's Office of health, Safety & Physical Education to expand such efforts to more schools.

SM 338. (GSOC338, NURS338) "Sweet Little Old Ladies and Sandwiched Daughters": Social Images and Issues in our Aging Society. (B) Kagan. Third or fourth year undergraduate students in any major BFS, JWS, and NUHP students.

This course is an intensive and focused introduction to social gerontology as a trans-disciplinary lens through which to examine aspects of social structure, actions, and consequences in an aging society.  A variety of sources are employed to introduce students from any field focused on human behavior and interaction to classical notions of social gerontology and current scholarly inquiry in gerontology.  Field work in the tradition of thickdescription creates a mechanism to engage students in newly gerontological understandings of their life worlds and daily interactions. Weekly field work, observing aspects of age and representations of aging and being old in every day experiences forms, is juxtaposed against close critical readings of classical works in social gerontology and current research literature as well as viewings of film and readings of popular literature as the basis for student analysis.  Student participation in the seminar demands careful scrutiny and critical synthesis of disparate intellectual, cultural, and social perspectives using readings and field work and creation of oral and written arguments that extend understandings of the issues at hand in new and substantive ways.  Emphasis is placed on analysis of field work and literature through a series of media reports and a final term paper.

SM 341. (GSOC318, NURS318) Race, Gender, Class and the History of American Health Care. (A) Distribution Course in Hist & Tradition. Class of 2009 & prior only. Fairman. For Benjamin Franklin Scholars & Nursing Honors Students.

This multidisciplinary course surveys the history of American health care through the multiple perspectives of race, gender, and class, and grounds th discussions in contemporary health issues.  It emphasizes the links between the past and present, using not only primary documents but materials from disciplines such as literature, art, sociology, and feminist studies that relate both closely and tangentially to the health professions and health ca issues.  Discussions will surround gender, class-based, ethnic, and racial ideas about the construction of disease, health and illness; the development of health care institutions; the interplay between religion and science; the experiences of patients and providers; and the response to disasters and epidemics.

359. (ANTH359) Nutritional Anthropology. (M) Staff.

Human nutrition and nutritional status within context of anthropology, health, and disease.  Particular emphasis on nutritional problems and the development of strategies to describe, analyze, and solve them.  Students will participate in the Urban Nutrition Initiative, an academically based community service project in local area schools.

SM 387. (HIST387, SAST388) Health Environments in Asia. (A) Ludden.

A comparative social history seeking to explain today's nutritional deficits among third world peoples.  Based on an eco-system approach, it considers contending theories, traces the rise of the world food system, and compares detailed case studies covering the period 1800-1980.

SM 404. (ENVS404) Urban Environments: Speaking About Lead in West Philadelphia. (M) Pepino. ABCS Course.  Local middle school visits required.

A study of selected aspects of urban environments, with an emphasis on West Philadelphia.  Students will engage middle school children in exercises of applied environmental research.

SM 405. (ENVS405) Urban Environment II. (A) Pepino. Prerequisite(s): HSOC 404 or permission of instructor. ABCS Course.  Local middle school visits required.

A detailed analysis of urban environmental issues.

SM 407. (ENVS407) Urban Environments: Prevention of Tobacco Smoking in Adolescents. (B) Pepino. ABCS Course.  Local middle school visits required.

This course will examine the short and long term physiological effects of smoking, social influences, the effectiveness of cessation programs, tobacco advocacy and the impact of the tobacco settlement.  Penn Students will work with middle school students on a campaign to prevent addiction to tobacco smoke.

SM 408. (ENVS408) Urban Environments: The Urban Asthma Epidemic. (B) Pepino. ABCS Course.  Visits to community centers required.

This course will examine the epidemiology of asthma, the potential causes of asthma, the public health issues and environmental triggers.  Penn students will collaborate with the Children's Hospital's clinical research study - Community Asthma Prevention Program.  Students will conduct environmental triggers classes in the community.

411. (SAST386, SAST686) Contemporary Issues in South Asian Health. (C) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Sheehan.

This course will focus on birth, aging, as well as selected chronic and infectious diseases in South Asia.  For each health condition/lifestyle a framework of anysis awill develop incorporating the complex set of factors thatcome into play.  Sociocultural beliefs; status markers--gender, class, caste,occupation;availability and accessibility of publicand private health services;state, national, and international plans and policies will be consideredd.  An overview of South Asian demography, health problems and services will introduce the course.

412. (SAST387) Traditional Medicine in South Asia: Historic Orgins and Contemporary Use. (G) Sheehan.

In South Asia, traditional medical systems (Ayurveda, Unani, and Siddha) have deep affiliation with the scientific, philosophical, religious, and cultural systems.  This course will examine the historic origins and socio-cultural dimensions of these systems.  Topics will include the encounter between traditional and Western medicine in the nineteenth century; twentieth century revival and professionalizing activities in the traditional systems; state and central government support for education, services, and research in traditional medicine; their role in the overall health care system; and their use by patients in urban and rural areas.  The world-wide interest in complimentary and alternative medicine as it relates to the Indian medical systems will be considered.

SM 420. (STSC420) Research Seminar. (M) Staff.

This seminar in research methods is required in the spring term for all juniors planning on writing a senior thesis in HSOC or STSC.

SM 421. (HIST471) Medicine and Development. (C) Distribution Course in Hist & Tradition. Class of 2009 & prior only. Feierman.

This course is devoted to readings and research about medicine and development in resource-poor countries.  The focus is on medical instiutions and practices as seen within the broader context of development.  We try to understand changing interpretations of how development takes place--of its relationship to technical knowledge, power and inequality.  The course give students the opportunity to do intensive original research.

SM 430. (STSC430) Disease & Society. (C) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Aronowitz.

What is disease?  In this seminar students will ask and answer this question by analyzing historical documents, scientific reports, and historical scholarship (primarily 19th and 20th century U.S. and European).  We will look at disease from multiple perspectives -- as a biological process, clinical entity, population phenomenon, historical actor and personal experience.  We will pay special attention to how diseases have been recognized, diagnosed, named and classified in different eras, cultures and professional settings.

SM 437. (ANTH437, SOCI437) Cultural Models & Health. (C) Distribution Course in Society. Class of 2009 & prior only. Barg.

There is a great deal of variation among population groups in the incidence of and mortality from most major diseases.  Biological and social factors can account for some of this variation.  However, there is increasing evidence that behavior- and the cultural models that are linked to health behavior- play an important role too.  Cognitive anthropology is the study of how people in social groups conceive of objects and events in their world.  It provides a framework for understanding how members of different groups categorize illness and treatment.  It also helps to explain why risk perception, helpseeking behavior, and decision making styles vary to the extent they do.  This seminar will explore the history of cognitive anthropology, schema theory, connectionism, the role of cultural models, and factors affecting health decision making.  Methods for identifying cultural models will be discussed and practiced.  Implications for health communication will be discussed.

SM 441. (ANTH441) Cross Cultural Approaches to Health. (M) Staff.

This course will explore the ways that health and illness-related beliefs and behaviors develop within communities.  We will identify the forces that shape these beliefs and behaviors and ultimately affect who gets sick, who gets well, and the very nature of the illness experience.  Emphasis will be given to the relationships among sociocultural, political and biological factors and the ways that these factors interact to produce the variation that we see in health and illness related attitudes, behaviors and outcomes across cultures.

499. Independent Study. (C)