Review by Robert C. Abrams, M.D. Field Light, Owen Lewis At the heart of Owen Lewis’ latest collection of poems, Field Light, is the story of a middle-aged man at a multi-focal impasse—emotional, temporal, marital, professional. That man is Lewis himself, who finds himself unable to move beyond a crucial juncture in his life. The […]
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What Poetry Can Do For Us During the Pandemic
Blog by Alisha Yi and David Xiang “Thank you for this time. I needed this,” one participant remarked after sharing her poem of recently losing a family member. It is moments like this that we are reminded of the healing power of poetry—its ability to permit us to wrestle with our feelings, to redefine our […]
Making Bodies Kosher: The Politics of Reproduction among Haredi Jews in England
Book Review by Angela Davis Ben Kasstan. Making Bodies Kosher: The Politics of Reproduction among Haredi Jews in England. Berghahn Books, 2019. 286 pages. ISBN: 9781789202281. In Making Bodies Kosher, Ben Kasstan, a social and medical anthropologist, explores how Haredi (strictly religiously observant) Jews navigate the complexities of engaging with biomedical maternity and infant health […]
Call for Abstracts (Issue 11: Summer 2021): Illness, Narrated
Guest Editors: Silvia Boide, Benjamin Brendel, Maaike Hommes and Melanie Kreitler In response to debates considering the relationship between illness and narrative, and the extent to which these concepts can be seen as mutually constitutive, this issue of On_Culture seeks to gather new approaches and critical perspectives to the intricate relationship between narrative and illness. We welcome […]
The Best of Intentions
Film Review by Professor Robert Abrams, Professor of Old Age Psychiatry, Weill Cornell Medicine ‘Papa’, directed by Natalie Labarre (2016, USA) Papa is a bright, fast-moving animation, delightful to watch, but in just over 6 minutes more complex and nuanced than one realizes at first. The film is an autobiographical take by the director Natalie […]
What’s at Hand?
Blog by Swati Joshi As a Medical Humanities researcher, I have always wondered how we learn about our body through language and how our anatomy forms the metaphorical elements of the linguistic corpus. This piece attempts to map the transformation in our understanding of hands in the face of the pandemic of COVID-19. Language has […]
December 2017 Special Issue: Shame, Stigma and Medicine
Why Shame, Stigma and Medicine? Luna Dolezal and Barry Lyons introduce their special journal issue on Shame, Stigma and Medicine Shame, stigma and medicine by Barry Lyons, Luna Dolezal Shame and the vulnerable self in medical contexts: the compassionate solution by Paul Gilbert A dirty little secret: stigma, shame and hepatitis C in the health […]
Numbness and Angels
Reflection by Clare Best Risk-reducing bilateral mastectomy, December 2006. We have breast cancer in the family, on my mother’s side. While I was starting to think about whether to have preventive surgery, my cousin developed multiple aggressive tumours. This meant that in two generations of women I was the only one who had not yet […]
Immunity-Based Licenses and the Politics of the Body
Blog by Insa Marie Schmidt, MD, MPH As COVID-19 continues to ravage the globe, several countries have now proposed to issue certifications proving that a person has developed immunity against the disease, either through recovery from infection or through a potential vaccine. These so-called “immunity passports” or “immunity-based licenses” would allow those who have antibodies […]
#WhiteCoatforBlackLives: Physicians Advocating for Social Justice
Blog by Dr Neha Pidatala White Coats for Black Lives movement was ignited six years ago, when Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager, was murdered by a police officer in Ferguson, MO. In 2014, nationwide “die-in” protests were held in more than 75 medical schools in protest of police brutality. George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis […]