Apologies for crossposting,
Manuela Rossini


Date: Thu, 12 Aug 2004 16:33:13 -0500
From: "Matthew Ramsey, Director, Center for Medicine, Health &
Society"
     <[log in to unmask]>

Call for Papers
Interdisciplinary Conference:

RETHINKING INEQUALITIES AND DIFFERENCES IN MEDICINE

April 29-May 1, 2005
Vanderbilt University
Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.A.

Over the last decade, two interconnected issues have occupied a
rapidly growing place in social studies of medicine: disparities in
health and health care, and cultural differences that affect
health-related behaviors and patients' interactions with the
health-care system. These topics have proved remarkably fruitful as
subjects for research and teaching.  Yet the underlying concepts
and assumptions have rarely received the critical reexamination
they deserve.

This conference is intended to bring together scholars from
multiple disciplines to share and discuss new approaches to the
study of inequalities and differences in medicine.  Among the
central questions to be addressed are how we define and measure
inequalities and whether the differences that shape patient
behaviors in various population groups are best understood in
cultural, socioeconomic, or other terms.  The keynote speakers will
be David R. Williams (Departments of Sociology and Epidemiology,
University of Michigan), a leading authority on race-based
disparities in American health care, and physician and medical
anthropologist Vinh Kim Nguyen (Department of Social Studies and
Medicine, McGill University Faculty of Medicine), whose research
focuses on the HIV epidemic in West Africa.   Proposals are invited
for 20-minute papers or 3-paper sessions from researchers in any
appropriate field or fields. Papers may be either theoretical or
empirical in emphasis.  Proposals that provide an international or
historical perspective would be particularly welcome. Possible
themes include but are not limited to:

*the concept of cultural difference in medicine
*defining disparities - race, ethnicity, gender, class, occupation
*health inequalities in colonial and postcolonial settings
*globalization and health inequalities
*narrative understandings of inequalities and differences
(including but not limited to patient narratives).

Send a 300-word abstract and a vita for each proposed participant
as e-mail attachments by Monday, November 1, 2004 to the joint
conference organizers, listed below.  Presenters will receive a
travel grant of $750 to help cover the costs of transportation and
lodging.

The conference is jointly sponsored by the Robert Penn Warren
Center for the Humanities and the Center for Medicine, Health, and
Society at Vanderbilt University.  It grew out of a year-long
interdisciplinary fellows seminar at the Warren Center in
2003-2004.  Current plans call for publishing selected conference
papers together with contributions from the Warren Center fellows
in a volume edited by the joint conference organizers.
--------

Joint Conference Organizers:

Professor Matthew Ramsey
Center for Medicine, Health & Society
Vanderbilt University
VU Station B #351656, 2301 Vanderbilt Place
Nashville, TN 37235-1656, U.S.A.
1-615-322-0096 (voice)
1-615-343-6002 (fax)
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Professor Larry Churchill
Center for Clinical and Research Ethics
Vanderbilt University Medical Center
319 Oxford House
Nashville, TN 37232 4350, U.S.A.
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1-615-936-2686 (voice)
1-615-936-3800 (fax)

======================================================
==============

-----------------------------

Matthew Ramsey

Director
Vanderbilt Center for Medicine, Health and Society

351656 Station B
Vanderbilt University
Nashville, TN 37235-1656

Voice: 615-322-0096
Fax: 615-343-6002
--------------------

MHS Web page:
http://people.vanderbilt.edu/~matthew.ramsey/mhs.htm
Listserv: [log in to unmask]