Race, Racialization, and Health

This course is an introduction to conceptualizations of race and racialization in health and anthropological thought on the study of medicine practices, with particular attention to the ways that disease burden and differential access to healthcare are shaped by broader histories of colonialism, imperialism, and development. We begin with a focus on the invention of racial categories in North America as a means of justifying slavery, Indigenous land dispossession, and the accumulation of property by those settlers deemed “white”. From this foundation, we will interrogate the ways that “race as biology” becomes mobilized in scientific and clinical discourses to justify and explain health disparities. In examining health disparities, we will engage with studies of race science, medical racism, medical experimentation, and structural violence in/of health care to understand how intersections of oppressed identities impact peoples’ ability to live and live well.