Configuring Contagion - Ethnographies of Biosocial Epidemics

Expanding our understanding of contagion beyond the typical notions of infection and pandemics, this book widens the field to include the concept of biosocial epidemics. The chapters propose varied and detailed answers to questions about epidemics and their contagious potential for specific infections and non-infectious conditions. Together they explore how inseparable social and biological processes configure co-existing influences, which create epidemics, and in doing so stress the role of social inequality in these processes. The authors compellingly show that epidemics do not spread evenly in populations or through simple coincidental biological contagion: they are biosocially structured and selective, and happen under specific economic, political and environmental conditions. This volume illustrates that an understanding of biosocial factors is vital for ensuring effective strategies for the containment of epidemics.

About the author

Lotte Meinert is Professor at the Department of Anthropology, Aarhus University. Her book publications include Biosocial Worlds: Anthropology of Health Environments beyond Determinism (UCL, 2020) edited with Jens Seeberg and Andreas Roepstorff and Time Work: Studies of Temporal Agency (Berghahn, 2020) edited with Michael Flaherty and Anne Line Dalsgård.

Jens Seeberg is Professor of Anthropology at Aarhus University. He is the director at the Center for Biosocial Inquiries at Aarhus University and has published on a variety of subjects including inequity in health, private healthcare and medical systems in India.

Product details

• Authors: Lotte Seeberg Meinert
• Assisted by: Lotte Meinert (Editor), Meinert Lotte (Editor), Jens Seeberg (Editor)
• Publisher: BERGHAHN BOOKS, INC
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 01.11.2024
• EAN: 9781805397274
• ISBN: 978-1-80539-727-4
• No. of pages: 274
• Series: Epistemologies of Healing
• Subjects: Social sciences, law, business > Social sciences (general); SOCIAL SCIENCE / Disease & Health Issues, MEDICAL / Infectious Diseases, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Anthropology / Cultural & Social, Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography, Infectious & contagious diseases, Social and cultural anthropology, Medical Sociology, Infectious and contagious diseases, SDG 3