ANTH 270 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Domestic Violence, Lung Cancer, Cholera
Document Summary
What counts as normal is actually statistically average. Eg blood tests, what is normal and what is pathological. Normal is also equated with what is morally right. Menopause - young female bodies were seen as the normal against which all. Or the stigma surrounding spousal abuse vs. breast cancer. Lung cancer we blame it on the patient female bodies should be compared. Biology uses statistics and technology to make the distinction between normal and pathological. What counts as disease comes about as a result of political/social/technical relationships. Biomedicine claims objectivity, but this doesn"t take into account local context. Health is no longer understood simply as absence of disease . The increased safety and ease of surgery have produced an explosion in the volume of operations being performed. Surgery has become established as an essential tool for helping people live long and healthy lives.
