Medicine And The Body

Description:
'An intelligent and informed account of medical sociology. Simon Williams has produced an original and comprehensive sociological statement of the centrality of the body to an understanding of medicine, health and illness. His scope is impressive...It will shape future teaching and research in the field of health and illness' - Bryan S Turner, Professor of Sociology, University of Cambridge This is a clear, well-written account of medicine, health and the body. Taking recent debates on the body and society as its point of departure, the book critically reexamines a series of embodied issues and emotional agendas in health and illness.Included here are cutting edge discussions and debates concerning: - the medicalized body - health inequalities - childhood and ageing - the dilemmas of high-tech medicine - chronic illness and disability - caring and (bio)ethics - sleep, death and dying - the body in late/postmodernity Written in an accessible, engaging style, with many original and innovative insights, the book will appeal to undergraduate and postgraduate students alike, and to researchers and lecturers with an interest in the embodied agendas of health and medicine in the new millennium.

Review:
'An intelligent and informed account of medical sociology. Simon Williams has produced an original and comprehensive sociological statement of the centrality of the body to an understanding of medicine, health and illness. His scope is impressive, including among other topics sleep, childhood, disability and ageing. It will shape future teaching and research in the field of health and illness' - Bryan S Turner, Professor of Sociology, University of Cambridge

Table of Contents:
Introduction Medical Sociology in the New Millennium The Biomedical Body Reductionism, Constructionism and Beyond What Is Health? Thinking through the Boundaries of the Body 'Structuring' Bodies Emotions, Inequalities and Health Children, Ageing and Health Bodies across the Lifecourse Bodily Dys-Order Chronic Illness a Biographical Disruption? Dormant/Mortal Bodies Sleep, Death and Dying in Late/Postmodernity Reason, Emotion and 'Mental' Health Where Do We Draw the Line? Hi-Tech Bodies From Corporeality to Hyperreality? Caring Bodies/Embodied Ethics Conclusions The Challenges Ahead