This engaging and accessible reader takes a social problems approach to health and medicine, providing a broad and critical lens on contemporary health problems. Designed for courses on social problems and on medical sociology, the volume embraces two fundamental principles: that health and illness are at least partly socially produced, and that health care is not an unfettered good and often brings with it serious social problems. The volume is organized into six sections, addressing the medicalization of human problems; the social construction of health problems; social movements; gender;...
This engaging and accessible reader takes a social problems approach to health and medicine, providing a broad and critical lens on contemporary healt...
Over the past half-century, the social terrain of health and illness has been transformed. What were once considered normal human events and common human problems--birth, aging, menopause, alcoholism, and obesity--are now viewed as medical conditions. For better or worse, medicine increasingly permeates aspects of daily life.
Building on more than three decades of research, Peter Conrad explores the changing forces behind this trend with case studies of short stature, social anxiety, -male menopause, - erectile dysfunction, adult ADHD, and sexual orientation. He examines the...
Over the past half-century, the social terrain of health and illness has been transformed. What were once considered normal human events and common...
