Enrolments for 2021 have closed.
Illness and Healing
Undergraduate | MAQ-ANTX2002 | 2021
Previously MAQ-ANTX202
Course information for 2021 intake View information for 2024 course intake
Examine healing practices and attitudes to illness from across the globe. Step into the world of biomedicine and shamanism. Think about attitudes to mental health and madness. Scan the role of imaging technologies in modern medicine.
- Study method
- 100% online
- Assessments
- 100% online
- Entry requirements
- Prior study needed
- Duration
- 18 weeks
HECS-HELP and FEE-HELP available
Illness and Healing
About this subject
On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:
- Demonstrate command of anthropological knowledge and theory as it relates to medical anthropology and the broader study of illness and healing practices in their social and cultural contexts.
- Identify the processes through which biology, culture, politics, and ecology interact to shape illness and health, health systems, and patterns.
- Research, analyse, and represent the illness experience of a person or community, emphasizing the integrative factors (culture, politics, social structure, etc.) influencing the condition.
- Identify and apply the theories and concepts of medical anthropology to critically evaluate one’s own culture and determinants of illness and health.
- Analyse how illness and health (and normality) are constructed within particular social, cultural, political, and environmental contexts.
- Analyse how inequality, social hierarchy, and structural violence generate unequal and often unique health determinants in the global and transnational context.
- A week-by-week guide to the topics you will explore in this subject will be provided in your study materials.
This unit offers an introduction to medical anthropology and cross-cultural beliefs relating to illness and healing. We will examine health and illness from a multilevel perspective that explores the evolution of human disease, the role of culture in shaping epidemiology, varying cultural notions of disease causality, the individual experience of illness, and the socio-political factors that condition our experience and management of negatively-valued states of health. Throughout, the unit emphasizes that good health - and conversely ill health - is never simply a "fact" about the body. Disease and illness have social and biological origins, which means our understanding of this central fact of human life must incorporate not only biological factors, but also the broader cultural frameworks that transform mere disease into the culturally-specific experience of illness. All enrolment queries should be directed to Open Universities Australia (OUA): see www.open.edu.au
- Long Essay (40%)
- Short esssay (30%)
- Tutoial Participation (30%)
For textbook details check your university's handbook, website or learning management system (LMS).
This research-intensive university in north-western Sydney offers a range of undergraduate and postgraduate degrees. With over 44,000 current students, Macquarie has a strong reputation for welcoming international students and embracing flexible and convenient study options, including its partnership with Open Universities Australia.
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- QS Ranking 2024:
- 10
- Times Higher Education Ranking 2024:
- 10
Entry requirements
Equivalent subjects
You should not enrol in this subject if you have successfully completed any of the following subject(s) because they are considered academically equivalent:
MAQ-ANT202 (Not currently available)
MAQ-ANTX202 (Not currently available)
Others
NCCW (pre-2020 units): ANT202, ANTH202, ANTH274, ANTX202
NCCW (2020 and onwards): ANTH2002 Illness and Healing
Additional requirements
- Other requirements -
Students who have an Academic Standing of Suspension or Exclusion under Macquarie University's Academic Progression Policy are not permitted to enrol in OUA units offered by Macquarie University. Students with an Academic Standing of Suspension or Exclusion who have enrolled in units through OUA will be withdrawn.
Study load
- 0.125 EFTSL
- This is in the range of 10 to 12 hours of study each week.
Equivalent full time study load (EFTSL) is one way to calculate your study load. One (1.0) EFTSL is equivalent to a full-time study load for one year.
Find out more information on Commonwealth Loans to understand what this means to your eligibility for financial support.
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