GENDERED PERSPECTIVES ON MEDICINE: AN INTRODUCTION

Abstract

This is a volume about gender, health and medicine broadly defined. It is based on the now widely-held assumption in the sociology of medicine that medicine and health are social constructions and that gender is an embedded part of them (see Lorber, 1997). The essays reveal that embedded with gender in the institution of medicine are race, class, and sexuality. Taken as a whole, the volume offers a critique of exclusively biomedical approaches to personal and public health and calls for more sociological input and qualitative research to help us understand aspects of health and illness. Among the recurrent themes in the seven essays are the medicalization of personal and social problems, the commodification of healthcare, and questions of agency, responsibility and control.

Citation

Texler Segal, M., Demos, V. and Jacobs Kronenfeld, J. (2003), "GENDERED PERSPECTIVES ON MEDICINE: AN INTRODUCTION", Texler Segal, M., Demos, V. and Kronenfeld, J.J. (Ed.) Gender Perspectives on Health and Medicine (Advances in Gender Research, Vol. 7), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 1-9. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1529-2126(03)07001-2