What is Medical Anthropology?

Question 1

Define anthropology. Briefly describe how anthropology applies a holistic perspective

Answer 1

Anthropology is the study of what makes us human. They consider the past, through archaeology, to see how human groups lived hundreds or thousands of years ago and what was important to them.

Question 2

What is meant by the “four-field approach”?

Answer 2

Biological anthropology
Cultural anthropology
Linguistic anthropology
Archeology

Question 3

What is Medical Anthropology? What do Medical Anthropologists do?

Answer 3

Medical Anthropology is the study of health, illness, healthcare, and
related topics from a broad anthropological perspective.
*Medical anthropologists help us to understand:
*Factors that influence health and wellbeing
*Experience of illness and distribution of illness
*Interpretation of the causes of illness
*Prevention and treatment methods/remedies
*Healing process and practices of medical pluralism

Question 4

What are the key concepts used in Medical Anthropology?

Answer 4

Health: a state of well-being, including physical, mental, emotional, social, and spiritual wellbeing
Disease: a biological abnormality located within a body and traceable by biomedicine
Illness: an individual’s subjective or sociocultural experience of a disruption to physical or mental health
Sickness: a social perception of ill health (social roles of a sick person is culture specific)
Malady : an anthropological term encompasses all the three human experience of disease, illness, and
sickness

Question 5

What is the development of Medical Anthropology in the mid-20th century.

Answer 5

Rooted within four-field of American anthropology in the early
20th century, with a strong connection to early European
anthropologists’ study of religion.

Question 6

What was the earliest focus of medical anthropology?

Answer 6

Interrelationship of human development and health, biological characteristics, and social-cultural factors, such as nutrition and childrearing practices

Question 7

What factors do Medical Anthropologists consider when they deal with health and illnesses?

Question 8

Briefly describe the biocultural approach/perspective. How do Medical Anthropologists use the biocultural approach to understand human health and illness?

Answer 8

A biocultural perspective considers the social, ecological, and biological aspects of health issues and how they interact within and across populations
Biocultural approach employs historical, cultural, and evolutionary perspectives to understand human health and illnesses

Question 9

How is a biocultural approach different from biomedicine?

Answer 9

Biomedicine studies the human body, and analyses the prevention, development, and impact of chronic diseases and genetic disorders on our health.

Question 10

Define the concept of culture and describe the basic features of culture

Answer 10

Culture consists of beliefs, traditions, customs, and ideas that humans learn as members of society.Culture allows humans to adapt and transform the world around them.

Question 11

Ethnography and ethnographic fieldwork

Answer 11

Ethnography: the detail description of a particular culture.
Ethnographic fieldwork: an extended period of close involvement with the people whose way of life interests an anthropologist

Question 12

Participant observation

Answer 12

A research tool used to learn about a culture, it involves social participation and personal observation.

Question 13

Etic and Emic perspectives

Answer 13

The insider’s view ( emic perspective): how a member of the group would describe or interpret the behavior of group members.

The outsider’s (etic perspective): observing behavior as if from a distance and with no prior knowledge about its emic meaning.

Question 14

Biological Anthropology

Answer 14

Palaeontology
Human biology and variation Primatology

Question 15

Cultural Anthropology

Answer 15

Kinship and social organization

Question 16

Archeology

Answer 16

Prehistoric & historical anthropology

Question 17

Linguistic Anthropology

Answer 17

Descriptive, Comparative and Historical linguistic

Question 18

What do Medical Anthropologists do?

Answer 18

Study the factors influencing variability and universality in health and disease experiences across human populations and across time
* Explore the ways that human populations react to and handle disease or illness
* Focus on health in its cultural context
* Examine the factors that contribute to disease or illness
* Take a biocultural perspective, linking health, disease, illness, environment, and culture

Question 19

Medical Anthropology

Answer 19

Is the study of health, illness, healthcare, and related topics from a broad anthropological perspective

Question 20

Sociocultural Anthropology

Answer 20

Is the study of human individuals and societies, their behaviours and beliefs, and everything about human culture

Question 21

Development Anthropology

Answer 21

The application of anthropological perspectives to the multidisciplinary branch of development studies

Question 22

Physical Anthropology

Answer 22

Is the study of human beings’ biology, evolution, physical variation, and behaviour

Question 23

Holistic Perspective

Answer 23

A characteristic of the anthropological perspective that involves the study of the whole of the human condition, past, present, and future, including biology, society, language, and culture

Question 24

Biocultural perspective

Answer 24

Considers the social, ecological, and biological aspects of health issues and how they interact within and across populations