ANTH 347 - Outbreak, Emergency, Pandemic: Anthropology of Health Systems

In the past few decades, infectious diseases such as HIV, Ebola, and COVID-19 have illuminated the urgency of health systems research. These mass infections have also highlighted the strengths and weakness of different health systems, while also illustrating just how complex and unwieldy public health interventions can be. Even in supposedly “developed” or “wealthy” countries, public health interventions in mass infections can exacerbate existing inequalities along lines of race, class, and gender, sharpen political antagonisms, prop up cronyism, erode existing health services by redirecting resources in ways that negatively impact public health in the process, and radically transform how individuals and groups regard themselves and others. Ethnographic research provides a critical vantage point for thinking about what health policy and health systems do and what they mean beyond their stated intentions and actions. Focusing on epidemics past, present, and future, this class will pose the following questions: What can ethnographic research illuminate about health systems, particularly health systems under immense strain? What do strategies implemented to respond to mass infections tell us about how public health policymakers view the world, and the historical and political contexts that give rise to these visions? In what ways must ethnographers modify their research methodologies to respond to outbreaks of infectious disease? We will also explore different ways anthropologists engage with health policy making and health systems reform, and critically examine the ramifications of these engagements.

Unit(s): 1
Group Distribution Requirement(s): Distribution Group II
Prerequisite(s): ANTH 201 or ANTH 211
Instructional Method: Conference
Grading Mode: Letter grading (A-F)
Notes: This course applies to the department’s SETS concentration.
Not offered: 2023-24
Group Distribution Learning Outcome(s):

Evaluate data and/or sources.
Analyze institutions, formations, languages, structures, or processes, whether social, political, religious, economic, cultural, intellectual or other.
Think in sophisticated ways about causation, social and/or historical change, human cognition, or the relationship between individuals and society, or engage with social, political, religious or economic theory in other areas.