By Sanja Maretic
Welcome to the month of June where we take a deep dive into the societal structures and downstream implications of health that orchestrate lives of us all in variety of ways. It is not uncommon for the world of Academia to privilege epistemological questions (questions about knowledge) over societal (or to turn societal questions into epistemological - so called medicalisation of society) BUT problems of pain, illness, and health are not just problems of knowledge, they are irrevocably and intrinsically woven to the structures of power and wider social oppressions that make people sick in the first place.
Poverty, racism, ableism, misogyny, sexism, transphobia, homophobia are some ways to be oppressed and excluded. But what does that actually mean? What does it really mean to be excluded?
This month of June, we will be attending to one documentary and two research papers as a doorway for us to enter the social landscape and attend closely to the questions of power and privilege: Whose bodies /voices/stories matter? Whose bodies/voices/stories matter less?
Here is our June literature:
1. Humanities piece: Southern Comfort - documentary (Transgender Genre) by Kate Davis
2. MacMillan A. 2021. Osteopathic Ableism: A critical disability view of traditional osteopathic theory in modern practice, International Journal of Osteopathic Medicine, 42, pp.46-60
3. Ross M.H., Setchell J. 2019. People who identify as LGBTIQ+ can experience assumptions, discomfort, some discrimination, and a lack of knowledge while attending physiotherapy: a survey. Journal of Physiotherapy, 65(2)
This month we will be reading more by reading less. We acknowledge that social justice work is a hard and painful commitment that starts from a space within us. Questions we put underneath the readings are simply there to guide, nobody will be questioned on them and we want everyone to feel safe and free to bring their own questions to the table.
Our June discussion is on: Thursday 30th June at 20.30 Amsterdam time
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