Postcolonial approaches to the study of race and health

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Postcolonial approaches to the study of race and
health
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Postcolonial Approaches

• Postcolonial
• After colonization (temporally)
• Beyond colonialism (critically)
• Takes a critical view of colonization ?
  anti-colonial !!
• Critical of historical forms of economic, social
  and political colonialism
• Critical of contemporary forms of discrimination,
  domination, colonization, oppression
• Usually studies looking at RACE/ ETHNICITY of the
  Colonized and Colonizing world (the West and
  the rest)

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Postcolonial approaches focus on

• Colonization of the body
• 1. Study of economic and political impacts and
  effects of colonialism during and after
  independence eg Packard on South Africa
• 2. Studies of other forms of social/ economic/
  political and racialized exploitation and their
  legacy eg Savitt on Slavery, Gish on South Africa
• Colonization of the mind
• 3. Examination of the psychological effects of
  domination and oppression
• Loss of cultural roots (language, belief systems,
  faith, literature, art work)

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• Interest in how power is exerted, justified,
  enabled through forms of knowledge and
  representation or Discourse
• Packard on South Africa, Savitt on Slavery, Lea
  on Aboriginal health
• Jarosz on representations of Africa
• Farmer on stereotypes around Haitians and AIDS
• Joffe on representations of Ebola

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• Focus on Language and representation
• Analysis of visual and written texts
• Focus on Power Relations
• Along lines of race, nationality, religion
• Focus on links between Discourse and the Real
  world
• How discourse is used to justify real world
  interventions
• eg military, economic (structural adjustment),
  health care

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What is discourse?

• Discourses are ways of knowing, regimes of truth
  about the world
• eg about why African Americans living under
  slavery have higher rates of TB (Savitt)
• eg about places like Africa (Jarosz) or people
  like Aborigines (Lea)
• Discourses are made up of the ideas, beliefs,
  values, ideologies
• These are produced in many different forms
• Produced by individuals, groups and institutions
• Parents, peers, priest, doctors, patients,
  general public, politicians, experts, film
  makers, writers etc
• Includes written texts and visual imagery
• Advertisements, newspaper articles, books,
  Hollywood films, school curriculum, training
  manuals, scientific work, internet blogs, diaries
  of colonial explorers, letters home
• All these sources of information make up the
  cultural apparatus

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Cultural apparatus

• The cultural apparatus is composed of all the
  organizations and milieux in which artistic,
  intellectual and scientific work goes on and by
  which such work is made availableit contains an
  elaborate set of institutions the family,
  religion, schools and theatres, newspapers and
  census bureaus, laboratories, museums, magazines
  and radio networks. Inside the apparatus are the
  images, meanings and slogans that define the
  worlds in which we live are organized and
  compared, maintained and revised, lost or
  cherished, hidden, debunked, celebrated. Taken as
  a whole the cultural apparatus is the lens of
  mankind through which men see, the medium by
  which they interpret an report what they see
  CWMills

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How can discourse affect material realities of
life?

• Philosopher Edward Said developed postcolonial
  theory to study Western perceptions of the
  Orient or the Middle/ Near East
• He argued that knowledge and representation
  DISCOURSES about this area worked powerfully to
  enable military, political, economic
  interventions
• eg stereotypes of Arabs as violent, mysterious,
  distant, sexual
• Reproduced notions of us and them
• Works to reproduce different, can heighten
  inequalities
• View film On Orientalism
• What does this have to do with health?
• Draw on egs from your readings

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Depictions of darkness and disease
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Scientific categorization
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What are some of the sources of knowledge and
information around health?

• Biomedical Knowledge
• Clinic practice
• Public Health information
• Popular stereotypes/ beliefs
• Knowledge produced in academia
• Knowledge produced by experts in the field
• colonial administrators, doctors, World Health
  Policymakers, Stephen Bezruchka

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• What are some of the discourses around people,
  places and health that you can identify?
• What implications do these stereotypes have for
  the reproducing of racial inequalities?
• What are the implications for health?
• eg tomorrow Case of HIV/AIDS treatment and
  Medical Apartheid in South Africa

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Patterns in the discourse

• Construction of subjects and spaces
• Very repetitive, stereotyped ways
• eg exotic, sensual, violent, irrational,
  dependent, backwards, premodern
• Homogenization
• Vast diversity becomes obscured by stereotypes
• Can justify standard form of intervention to be
  applied
• eg military force, standardized development
  packages, public health policies etc
• OR can justify different types of intervention
• eg health care policies for Slaves in 1800s
• or health care policies today.

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• Use of binaries
• Dark/ Light
• Savage/Civilized
• Premodern/modern
• Backwards/ advanced
• Undeveloped/ developed
• Barbaric/ peaceful
• Theocratic/ democratic
• Serves to construct both them/ the Other but
  also Us/ the West.

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Conclusions

• Knowledge/ discourse can be a powerful way to
  reproduce inequality in society through
  repetition of ideas in imagery, assumptions,
  stereotypes, medical practice etc
• BUT knowledge is not value free/ objective
• Knowledge is subjective produced from a
  position.
• production of knowledge is politicized
• Reflects values, beliefs, attitudes
• Some discourses/ regimes of truth are more
  dominant that others and exert more power
• Wealth of knowledge/discourse is produced around
  health and illness
• Works powerfully
• Shapes historical and contemporary understandings
  of people and places
• Can reinforce racial hierarchies
• Can influences health policy, forms of treatment,
  experiences of ill health
• eg Tomorrows readings by Jones, Basu, Davis and
  Fort