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- Creators: School of Life Sciences
- Creators: Fessenden, Tracy
Description
Over the past three decades, medical anthropology research, published within both public health and anthropological journals, demonstrates both the prevalence of traditional folk medicine in Latino populations in the United States and the potential difficulty of negotiating these beliefs and practices with clinical, western biomedicine. I bring attention to what might be a narrative of divergent values that occurs in Latino communities in the United States. A well-documented source (Pachter, 1994) of this clash is the culturally pervasive use of folk medicine in Latino layperson populations seeking biomedical care in the Unites States (U.S.). Numerous studies (Padilla, 2001; Koss 1972) suggest that a significant portion of Latinos in the continental United States call upon folk knowledge to diagnose, reinterpret, and treat illness. The Puerto Rican population seems to be no exception, though few studies are specific to native-born Puerto Ricans living in Puerto Rico, where the issue of access to quality public health care becomes increasingly problematic. In this honors undergraduate thesis project, I conduct a review of the literature that bridges anthropology and public health research and proceed to describe a study I conducted on Culebra Island, Puerto Rico in May of 2015. The study aims to determine whether patient satisfaction can be linked to being treated by a physician hailing from a similar cultural background, or if an irredeemable disparity between patient and provider present a roadblock to health outcomes. I found that the Puerto Rican physicians are receptive to folk illness (symptoms) and consider folk therapy as part of the treatment regimen. The physicians make patients feel understood, which might improve treatment adherence and thus health outcomes. Still, respondents demonstrated that there is high patient trust in the biomedical model by emphasizing the use of conventional medications in tandem with the folk therapy. Nevertheless, the health care provider's disposition in regards to folk knowledge and modalities are important but does not present a roadblock to optimal care and health outcomes as much as access, available services or clinic resources.
ContributorsVanasse-Torres, Elena Georgina (Author) / Maupin, Jonathan (Thesis director) / Maienschein, Jane (Thesis director) / MartÃÂnez, AirÃÂn (Committee member) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
Art is an ancient, personal, and cultural phenomenon used to convey human creativity and emotion. Dating back as early as 40,000 years in Indonesian cave paintings, this medium has been used to record stories, histories, and shape cultural opinion throughout the history of mankind. While we have witnessed the rise and fall of types of art in popular culture and traditions, the core of art remains the same, which is to express the imagery within the human mind into a tangible form. As such, this allows for the candid acknowledgement and projection of an individual’s state of being into a productive, expressive skill which reaps therapeutic benefits.
ContributorsMahmud, Aysha (Co-author) / Shahid, Marija (Co-author) / Button, Melissa (Thesis director) / Moore, Marianne (Committee member) / School of Art (Contributor) / School of Life Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2019-05
Description
Immersion (tevillah) in a special pool of water (mikvah) is an ancient Jewish ritual act of purification. Rumors of personal healing through mikvah immersion are often presented as Jewish folklore or urban legends. Yet, my research shows that a surprising percentage of immersing respondents –both Orthodox and non-orthodox— have experienced mikvah immersion as either spiritually, emotionally, psychologically, or physically healing. My study investigates what it means to experience mikvah as healing; and whether these experiences correlate with other attitudes and personal practices that signal patterns in how Jews think about Self, purity, wellbeing, and healing. I conducted a survey (N=283) and 34 in-depth interviews in the United States, and an additional survey (N=239) in the United Kingdom –to determine how relevant the U.S. findings could be for the aspiring mikvah organization, Wellspring UK, that plans to incorporate mikvah as a central modality of care in a center for wellbeing in London. I interpret these findings through a ritual ecological analysis –integrating embodiment, ritual studies, history, and religious studies— that centers participants’ sensory-emotional descriptions of their immersion as centering and affirming, in the midst of personal suffering. I then seek to understand how immersers interpret these sensory experiences by framing their mikvah stories in the historical context of new conceptual constructs about body, self, wellbeing, healing, and purity that emerged from multiple Jewish engagements with the American Great Awakening (1960-1990). That sensory experiences of centering and affirmation are identified as healing reflects a holistic self-concept, observed among the majority of participants –immersers and non-immersers alike. Specifically, the contemporary Jewish self is a holistic body-self, integrating physical, spiritual, emotional, psychological, and relational aspects. Such holism means that upset in one aspect of the self produces difficulties in one or more of the other aspects. Thus, maintaining one’s sense of wellbeing requires continual balancing and rebalancing, a self-making project that dovetails with respondents’ high value for an emergent ideal of spiritual purity, defined as the alignment of one’s inner values with one’s outer speech and actions. Together, wellbeing and spiritual purity constitute an ideal state of radical shalom, as experienced during healing mikvah immersions.
ContributorsJohnston, Isobel-Marie (Author) / Gereboff, Joel (Thesis advisor) / Fessenden, Tracy (Committee member) / Cohen, Adam (Committee member) / Bailey, Marlon M. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2024
Description
“Her Brown Body Is Glory: A Legacy of Healing Forged Through Sisterhood and
Dance” fondly captures the process of creating the evening length dance project, Her
Brown Body Is Glory (HBBIG). This document addresses many themes, such as
liminality, rites of passage, trauma in the African American community (like the effects
of Dr. Joy DeGruy Leary’s “Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome (PTSS) theory), and
provides a perspective of healing rooted in dance, rituals, and community. This research
focuses on dance being the source of intervention to create sisterhood among African
American women of many shades. Throughout the creation of this dance project, the
choreographer and dancers collaboratively generated experiences to cultivate a space of
trust, vulnerability, sisterhood, and growth. The use of written, verbal, and movement
reflection supported this creative process as the main source of ritual to check in with
self, building community amongst the dancers, and generating choreography. The
insertion of these sisterhood rituals into the production became the necessary element of
witness for the audience to experience an authentic and moving performance of Her
Brown Body Is Glory.
Dance” fondly captures the process of creating the evening length dance project, Her
Brown Body Is Glory (HBBIG). This document addresses many themes, such as
liminality, rites of passage, trauma in the African American community (like the effects
of Dr. Joy DeGruy Leary’s “Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome (PTSS) theory), and
provides a perspective of healing rooted in dance, rituals, and community. This research
focuses on dance being the source of intervention to create sisterhood among African
American women of many shades. Throughout the creation of this dance project, the
choreographer and dancers collaboratively generated experiences to cultivate a space of
trust, vulnerability, sisterhood, and growth. The use of written, verbal, and movement
reflection supported this creative process as the main source of ritual to check in with
self, building community amongst the dancers, and generating choreography. The
insertion of these sisterhood rituals into the production became the necessary element of
witness for the audience to experience an authentic and moving performance of Her
Brown Body Is Glory.
ContributorsThomas, Hannah Victoria (Author) / Jackson, Naomi (Thesis advisor) / White, Marcus (Committee member) / Hunt, Kistin (Committee member) / Nascimiento, Eliciana (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2020