HPSC3002 - History of the Biomedical Sciences

Semester 2
Lecturer: Dr Charles Wolfe

Prerequisites: HPSC2100 and HPSC2101 (a Credit or above) and at least 24 credit points of Intermediate or Senior units of study
6 credit points
2 x 1-hour lectures, plus 2 x 1-hour tutorials per week (see timetable)
Assessment: tutorial work, essays, exam, tutorial participation


Body, Mind and Soul: The Doctor Knows Best


Throughout the ages people have been born, have died, and in between have lived in various stages of sickness or health. In this course we shall look at how these states of being were perceived in different times and places throughout history, while at the same time noting the increasing medicalisation of everyday life, together with the irony that the "miracles" of modern medicine appear to have created a generation of the "worried well". Using this historical perspective, we shall ask how perceptions of sickness, health and the related provision of health care have been intertwined with social, political and economic factors and, indeed still are today. In addition, we shall look at the constructions of the 'normal' body and the evolution of the figure of the doctor in Western culture, in relation to major shifts, both in scientific practice and in ideological outlook.


In This Unit of Study We Will Discuss:

• Social, political, economic and personal responses to "health scares"
• Witchcraft, magic and medicine
• Surgery, its uses and abuses
• Ancient, modern and postmodern perspectives on the body
• Normality and abnormality in the philosophy of medicine
• The clash between environmental health and laboratory medicine
• "Risk factors" in the maintenance of good health
• Regular and alternative practitioners
• Patients in the history of medicine