Applied antropology, Health and Community development

Overview

Over the last few years, applied antropology has developed tremendously in the area of health with the support of university programmes which delve into medical anthropology. Medical anthropology is a field which studies health issues, diseases, prevention and therapeutic procedures within the specific cultural context in which these processes take place. It is an interdisciplinary framework for action between the areas of biomedicine and social-cultural sciences which takes an antropological approach (i.e. holistic and comparative). Contributions of Medical Anthropology are emerging from four perspectives: biological, ecological, cultural and critical; with an additional focus on the applied dimension that is geared towards the health sector at both public and international scale. It is in applied antropology that we can appreciate the nature of those features that characterize Medical Anthropology: its holistic and comparative nature.
Revolutionary medicine, medical ecology, ethnomedicine and critical medical anthropology find common ground in an applied dimension which aims to solve concrete social problems by putting into practice Anthropology theory and its methods. Global Health is making efforts in order to create a series of culturally sensitive health programmes to meet local needs, which are a true success as the communities join the action.
The programme is intended to help the future experts in applied antropology understand how to tackle issues in the field of health and development in a varied range of cultural contexts in Spain and abroad.