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>
> Dear all,Here is aCALL FOR PAPERS10th EASA Biennial Conference
> Ljubljana, SloveniaAugust 26-30, 2008***From medical pluralism to  
> therapeutic plurality: medical anthropology and the politics of  
> diversity, knowledge, and experience from multiple  
> perspectives*ConvenorsLeonardo MenegolaUrÅ¡ula Lipovec Ä?ebron  
> (Faculty of Arts and Sciences, University of Ljubljana) 
> <ursula.lipovec%40gmail.com Clara Saraiva (Institute for Scientific  
> Tropical Research)<clarasaraiva%40fcsh.unl <leonardo.menegola% 
> 40gmail.com
>
> Short AbstractThis workshop will explore the tensions and  
> complementarities between biomedicine and 'other' medicines, and  
> the ways in which social representations and cultural constructions  
> embedded in the encounters between "the West and the Rest" migrate,  
> transform, or collide at the intersections of emergent scenarios of  
> contemporaneity. We will outline dynamics of exclusion and  
> inclusion between biomedical and alternative practitioners of  
> healing. We will examine the interactions occurring betweendistinct  
> discursive practices and systems of meaning relating to symptoms,  
> illnesses, models of affliction and wider socio-moral notions of  
> personhood and the Self. We will focus on the embodiments,  
> feelings, and sensations through which people make sense of  
> suffering, illness, and healing, and onthe political and  
> performative meaning of such experiences. We will explore the  
> strategic references made to "experience" by non-hegemonic  
> medicines that rely on the creation of experiences of  
> intersubjectivity and mutuality between healers and patients.
> Long AbstractThis workshop will explore different aspects of the  
> tensions andcomplementarities between biomedicine and 'other'  
> medicines. Through ethnographic evidences, we will contribute to  
> the study of diverse practicesof suffering and healing by focusing  
> on how social representations andcultural constructions embedded in  
> the encounters between "the West and theRest" migrate, transform,  
> or collide at the intersections of emergentscenarios of  
> contemporaneity. At the crossroad of medical pluralism  
> andtherapeutic plurality, human experiences, social  
> representations, andculturally embedded practices linked to  
> "suffering" will reveal a vastethnographic territory, across which  
> migrational processes will constituteone among the transversal  
> concerns of this workshop.We will outline dynamics of exclusion and  
> inclusion between biomedical andalternative practitioners of  
> healing in contexts of education andassociations; and within  
> processes of legalization in institutionalpractices and formal  
> professionalization. We will examine the interactionsoccurring  
> between distinct discursive practices and systems of meaningâ?? 
> ascarried out and reproduced by different social actorsâ??to  
> investigatesocially relevant ways in which diverging, pre- 
> established schemes andrepresentations interact with reference to  
> symptoms, illnesses, models ofaffliction and wider socio-moral  
> notions of personhood and the Self. Bylooking at the embodiments,  
> feelings, and sensations through which peoplemake sense of  
> suffering, illness, and healing, we will focus on the
> political and performative meaning of such experiences as forms of
> resistance, opposition, defence from systems of hegemony, and on the
> politically authorized, socially recognized ways of performing both
> sufferance and healing. We will explore the strategic references  
> made to
> "experience" (e.g. through the mundane world of sensing) by non- 
> hegemonic
> medicines that rely on the creation of experiences of  
> intersubjectivity andmutuality between healers and patients.Section  
> 1: Cultural Diversity as Knowledge and PracticeThis section deals  
> with the biomedical discourse on diversity andcross-cultural  
> communication and, at the same time, the absence ofdiscussion on  
> underestimated aspects of this relationship. By focusing onthe  
> building of knowledge and the articulation of criteria of efficacy 
> (clinical trials, standardization and quality control of other  
> "traditional"medicines,) we will explore the social use of  
> diversity in public healthpolicies, and we'll explore the  
> boundaries between culture and affliction byanalyzing the  
> articulation of different therapeutic theories and practicesamong  
> multiple social actors.Section 2: Politics and Challenges of  
> IntegrationThis section introduces a critical medical  
> anthropological discussion ofvarious concepts of medical pluralism,  
> and aims to draw ethnographicevidence on the ways in which  
> biomedicine can coexist and/or interweave withother medicines. From  
> both an applied and a theoretical perspective, theanalysis will  
> mainly focus on different strategic perspectives of actors  
> andinstitutions involved, such as: users, complementary and  
> traditionalhealers, medical professionals, health-care  
> institutions, insurancecompanies, etc, as well as on the complexity  
> of their mutual relationshipsin various ethnographic contexts,  
> especially in Latin America.Section 3: The Medical Anthropology of  
> "Experience:" Illness, Suffering,HealingThis section will explore  
> the socio-political meanings of "experience" indifferent contexts  
> of medical hegemony and pluralism. "Experience"identifies and  
> differentiates both suffering and healing practices; itenters  
> mechanisms of efficacy, apparatuses of techniques and the  
> practicalknowledge required to administer them. We will examine  
> "who" experiencessuffering, unease, processes of healing; "who or  
> what" manages or interpretssuch experiences and administrates the  
> dynamics of cure; and how social andmedical systems locally  
> structure (translate, legitimize, reshape, deny)particular facets  
> of experience.Section 4: Round Table: Healing as Plurality,  
> Politics, and ExperienceThe discussants, Chairs, and convenors of  
> the workshop will partake in afinal Round table. The discussion  
> will address "diversity" in its medical
> anthropological declination, both as migration of particular  
> individuals andgroups, and as encounter (hybridization, borrowing,  
> translation, struggle)between different practices of suffering and  
> healing. We will gaze atcultural diversity and medical pluralism  
> through a multiple perspective andthreefold socio-cultural lens: as  
> a cultural construction, as a socialstrategy, and as a political  
> performance. We will adopt multipleperspectives (e.g. focusing on  
> institutions, cultural heterogeneity, and theparticularities of  
> experiences of falling sick, being ill, returning to a'sense of  
> ordinary life'). We will thus contribute to the social andpolitical  
> analysis of the epistemological heterogeneity of sociallyco- 
> habiting healing systems, issues of therapeutic (or scientific)  
> efficacy,and dynamics of social inclusion and exclusion. Finally,  
> we will reflect onthe epistemological challenges of an increasingly  
> "pluralist" MedicalAnthropology, where plural scenarios and objects  
> give way toplural-synthetic conceptual frameworks and methods.
> *Chair*: Melissa Park, Chiara Pussetti, and Carlotta Bagaglia
> *Discussants*: Mariella Pandolfi (UQAM), Galina Lindqvist (Stockholm
> University) and Dough Hollan (UCLA)Papers should be proposed using  
> the online form (see
> http://www.nomadit.co.uk/easa/easa08/paperproposal.php5?PanelID=364) 
> You can access this workshop and the link for proposals directly at :
> http://www.nomadit.co.uk/easa/easa08/panels.php5?PanelID=364Please  
> forward this to anybody likely to be interested!Further information
> Leonardo [log in to unmask]
>

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