Interested in shifting attitudes towards disease and the human body? Join us in an investigation of western medicine throughout the ages. We delve into Classical medicine, examining the roots of western medicine, the beginnings of the medical marketplace and early treatments of disease. We map out the progress, and otherwise, in modern medicine of the eighteenth century. And we explore the medicalisation of modern society, narrative medicine and psychohistory.
Course Dates
Course details
Tutors
Key features
Aims of the course
- To introduce the study of Western medicine through historiography (study of writing history and of written histories).
- To explore primary and secondary texts, from Classical medicine to the modern day.
- To develop an appreciation of aetiology, treatments, and changing attitudes to disease and disability.
- To gain an understanding of the unpredictability of medical knowledge and progress: uncertainties; controversies; innovations; successes and failures.
Course content overview
- To explore aspects of the history of medicine: Who wrote it? For whom? When? Why?
- To learn why medicine has been said to have progressed ‘one death at a time’.
- To discuss Classical medicine, the rise of modern medicine in the eighteenth century, and the expansion of the medical marketplace into the present.
- To look at the medicalisation of modern society.
Target audience
Medics, historians, and those who are generally curious about socio-medical perceptions of the human body, and the way this relates to the past and present experience.
Week 0 – Orientation
Week 1 - What is history, and why a history of medicine?
To discuss how history frames our existence and how it connects to medical knowledge.
Learning outcomes:
- The means to analyse and interpret a source: what can a text wittingly and unwittingly tell us?
- Explored facts, what are they, where to find them, what to do with them
- An appreciation of narrative, argument, and the relationship between past and present – how did we get here?
- An understanding of how we can apply all this to medicine, the profession and the patient
Week 2 - From Classical to Early Modern Western Medicine
To explore the roots of Western medicine.
Learning outcomes:
- An understanding of Classical medicine and how this can still influence ideas and practice
- An appreciation of attitudes to the human mind and body – change and continuity
- A view of the prevailing early medical market-place
- Looked at diseases, beliefs and treatments - plague, smallpox, cholera, bleeding, purging, inoculation, midwifery, insanity...
Week 3 - The rise of science in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
To further map out the progress - and otherwise - of medical knowledge and treatments.
Learning outcomes:
- Knowledge of the remarkable discoveries and innovations that accompanied the rise of orthodox medicine, incl. anaesthetic, antiseptic, sanitation, surgery, drugs, toxicology, gynaecology, Alienists, etc.
- Explored the success of quacks and charlatans (ongoing...)
- Looked at some of the controversies, scandals, and politics of medicine during this period
Week 4 - Twentieth-century medicine to the present day
To trace the radically transformed and transformative effects of modern medicine.
Learning outcomes:
- Looked at key developments and advances, incl. antibiotics, vaccines, transplant, plastic surgery, contraception, technology, DNA, the NHS and public health, etc.
- An understanding of the medicalisation of society
- Explored the changing experience of practitioners and patients
Week 5 - Narrative medicine and psychohistory
To explore ways of improving communication and outcomes.
Learning outcomes:
- An understanding of useful literary techniques and their constructive application
- An appreciation of structure, clarity, brevity
- The means to develop a lucid style of engaging with others
- An appreciation of Narrative Medicine
Week 6 - Feedback
This course is open to everyone, and you don’t need any previous knowledge or experience of the subject to attend.
Our short courses are designed especially for adult learners who want to advance their personal or professional development. They are taught by tutors who are expert in both their subjects and in teaching students of all ages and experiences.
Please note that all teaching is in English. You should have near-native command of the English language to get the maximum benefit from the course.
Each week of an online course is roughly equivalent to 2-3 hours of classroom time. On top of this, participants should expect to spend roughly 2-3 hours reading material, etc., although this will vary from person to person.
While they have a specific start and end date and will follow a weekly schedule (for example, week 1 will cover topic A, week 2 will cover topic B), our tutor-led online courses are designed to be flexible and as such would normally not require participants to be online for a specific day of the week or time of the day (although some tutors may try to schedule times where participants can be online together for web seminars, which will be recorded so that those who are unable to be online at certain times are able to access material).
Unless otherwise stated, all course material will be posted on the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) so that they can be accessed at any time throughout the duration of the course and interaction with your tutor and fellow participants will take place through a variety of different ways which will allow for both synchronous and asynchronous learning (discussion boards etc).
Fees
The course fee includes access to the course on our VLE, personal feedback on your work from an expert tutor, a certificate of participation (if you complete work and take part in discussions), and access to the class resources for two years after your course finishes.
Concessions
For more information, please see our concessions information page.
Alison Fordham Bursary
University of Cambridge Professional and Continuing Education is proud to offer the Alison Fordham bursary, which is awarded to students who wish to study on one of our short online courses via our VLE, reducing the fee paid by 50%. The bursary is limited to a single award for each set of online courses.
Application criteria:
- applicants should set out their personal learning motivations since priority will be given to those who are returning to learning after an extended break, or have not previously engaged with fully online learning, or are seeking to use the online short course as a bridge towards undergraduate award-bearing study
- applicants who can demonstrate financial need
For more information, please see our bursaries information page.
A certificate of participation and a digital credential will be awarded to those who contribute constructively to weekly discussions, exercises and assignments for the duration of the course.
