Perspectives in Global Health

Catalog description

IGS 502: Perspectives in Global Health (Cat. I, 3 credits) The concept of "global health" has diverse meanings in different contexts. This graduate course will introduce students to multiple perspectives on global health and examine the debates and contestations that define this nascent field. Throughout the course, students will be in conversation with different disciplines—anthropology, public health, development studies and gender studies— and will critically examine global health as ideology and practice. Case studies and examples will primarily be drawn from Africa, North America, and internationally to facilitate cross-cultural comparisons and will focus, inter alia, on recent pandemic outbreaks (e.g., HIV/AIDS, COVID and Ebola) and long-standing global health challenges like maternal mortality and water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH). The key topics to be covered in the course will include: history of global health, interdisciplinary perspectives on global health; (de)coloniality and global health architecture, social determinants of health, global health interventions and their successes and failures, and planetary health. This course engages substantially with the following Sustainable Development Goals: no poverty, good health and wellbeing, gender equality, clean water and sanitation, reduced inequalities and partnerships for the goals. Recommended background: Acceptance into the Global Health Graduate program or permission of instructor.