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We invite proposals for an HSS panel on the intersection of medicine with populism: the occasions when patients’ preference for particular health practices is a political statement or an act of broad social solidarity. The proponents of many alternative medical traditions have adopted anti-elitist rhetoric in their outreach to potential patients, and indigenous medicine has often competed successfully with Western medicine in colonial settings even when other traditional practices have been suppressed. Yet not all “low” medicine reflects populist sensibilities: patients’ rejection of “elite” medicine in any given context may instead reflect doubts about its efficacy, or its availability.
We welcome abstracts from interested scholars in any national context or period whose work explores the effect of populist sentiments on the practice of medicine (or vice versa). Please contact Matthew Lavine at mbl87@msstate.edu with questions or proposals.
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