The «value» of life can be understood in manifold ways. Health and illness and their biomedical constitution are central to its definition. Historically, the medical and pathological discourses have drawn clear boundaries to isolate the two. Today, however, we live in knowledge societies and view health and illness as far more entangled, complex and tied to risks, vulnerabilities and subjective well-being. We have more control over our bodies, and the choices we make regarding our health and well-being have ethical and political implications. Inquiring about these ethical and political implications provokes questions about how we understand the ways in which health and illness are configured, responded to and enacted in various public policies, research and practice. The answers to these questions can show how science, policy and technologies together shape human conditions and subsequently, give meaning to the value of human life.
It is against this background that STS offers exciting new insights in how we conceive of human life if looked at through sets of practices, events, affects, performances and interactions between human and nonhuman bodies. It is the complexity of these interactions that co-constitute biomedical health interventions. Moreover, through biomedical technologies the value of life is extended to technologies of self(care) drawing together market, ethical and normative values. Hence, in this seminar we will look at a variety of biomedical innovations, evidence-making practices and implementation of global public health agendas across different country-contexts. We will explore a range of STS concepts in some foundational as well as novel literature across biomedicine and public health. As examples, we will focus on global agendas of disease elimination, vaccine innovations and policies, issues that lie at the intersection of biomedical, social and political like illegal drug use and international drug policy, prevention strategies viral outbreak and blood-borne viruses, mental health recovery programs, treatments of chronic conditions like diabetes, as well as technological advancements in caring for aging populations among other topics. We will ask critical questions such as how evidence is made; what are the ethical implications of health innovations?; how policies co-constitute problematizations in the very ways they offer ‘solutions’?; how biomedical technologies shape modern human health?; and finally, how can STS help us answer some of these questions?- Dozent: Aysel Sultan