Week #12: Health and Society: The Social Determinants of Health

medicalization

the process by which problems or issues not traditionally seen as medical come to be framed as such

• There's power in medical diagnoses +medical conditions hold legitimacy in the social world

Ex: mental illness, ASD/neurodivergence, homosexual, gender dysphoria, childbirth, obesity/GLP-1s, PTSD, ADHD, ED

illness

a person's subjective experience of their symptoms

• i.e.: what the patient brings to the doctor

Speaking of Sadness by David A. Karp

• A book depicting the illness experience of depression, including his own

• It reveals how depression is subjectively experienced and, yet, externally constructed

• A modern classic text in medical sociology

• symptomology of depression is wide-range: physical, psychological, mental

• sociological and moving portrait of depression

disease

the biologically-defined pathology from the professional/practitioner's perspective

• i.e. medicalized theory of disorder

Talcott Parson’s Sick Role

Talcott Parson’s term referring to the social rights + obligations of a sick individual

• Rights: relieved from social expectations + daily tasks (going to class, work, etc)

• Obligation: to get well and obey "doctors orders"

• Medical model ???

• Parsons ????

ex: sick students shouldn’t come to class

The Social Model: Example from Disability Studies

medical model holds that…

• Individual is disabled (treats individual as disorderly)

• We must treat the individual to restore physical functioning

The Social Model: Example from Disability Studies

social model holds that…

•  Individuals are not 'disabled' --- society is disabling

• We must reform out infrastructure and institutions to accommodate the individual