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Phenomenology of Health and Illness

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Encyclopedia of Medical Anthropology

Introduction

The last quarter of the 20th century has seen a shift in the social sciences, especially in anthropology, from objectified descriptions of the body in health and illness to subjective, in-depth explications of the body as lived. The experience of health and illness has been a central theme in medical anthropology in particular, and has been mirrored in other social and health science disciplines as well, including sociology, philosophy, nursing, and social medicine (Benner, 1994; A. Frank, 1995, Toombs, 1987, Toombs, 1993; Turner, 1992, Turner, 1996; Williams & Bendelow, 1998). This shift in how health is viewed by social scientists is part of a broader interpretive turn within the social sciences that has heralded a focus on experience of all sorts. Within this interpretive, phenomenological realm, medical anthropology and cultural anthropology have been closely entwined since the rise of this perspective. In cultural anthropology Bruner (1986, p. 5) has characterized...

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Acknowledgments

Preparation of this chapter was supported by grants R37 AG1114 4 and RO1 AG14152 from the National Institutes of Health, National Institute on Aging.

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  1. Gay Becker
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  1. Human Relations Area Files, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA

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Becker, G. (2004). Phenomenology of Health and Illness. In: Ember, C.R., Ember, M. (eds) Encyclopedia of Medical Anthropology. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-29905-X_14

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/0-387-29905-X_14

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA

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