OSHER 41 - History of Medicine

The goal of this course is to encourage students to think about medicine from an historical perspective, and to appreciate how medicine can inform the study of history. Students will investigate medicine in their particular historical and social contexts, employing diverse approaches--from historical and ethnographic methodologies to those informed by the study of science and technology--to examine the past and present workings of the medical sciences and technology, their grounds of authority, the ethical and political dimensions of their regulation and applications, and their relationships to larger intellectual, cultural, social, and political trends and changes.