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Dissertation Ideas: (Post)Colonialism and Medicine

Okay, so I was initially a medical student but next year I'm intercalating in Literature and Medicine. I'm a bit nervous jumping straight into the Eng Lit 3rd year class, especially because we have a 9000 dissertation to write (in order to get our Bachelor's of Science :rofl:

). It's been a few years since I last wrote an essay and though the term hasn't started I'm having a little panic.

My initial idea was to look at the idea of how medicine/disease/drugs changed from a postcolonial point of view but I'm drawing up blanks as to where to start my reading.

I've had a look at a few databases but the books they suggest range from Robinson Crusoe to Heart of Darkness to Moby-Dick, Disgrace by Coatzee to most of Gabriel Garcia Marquez (and much more). I don't have time to read everything on the list and since my topic is somewhat niche, I'm not sure how I'm going to be able to narrow the books down.

Does anyone have any suggestions? Or possibly any books that have 'infectious diseases' and 'postcolonialism' as a main theme? :tongue:

I feel like I'm perhaps biting off more than I can chew here.

Reply 1

hobnob

Original post by Mr Porter

My initial idea was to look at the idea of how medicine/disease/drugs changed from a postcolonial point of view but I'm drawing up blanks as to where to start my reading.

What exactly do you mean by that? :confused:

Reply 2

Mr Porter

Original post by hobnob

What exactly do you mean by that? :confused:

(edited 10 years ago)

Reply 3

hobnob

Original post by Mr Porter

Say the practice of tribal (alternative) medicine and how that changed with the influx of Western colonisers, with their own cultural medicinal/scientific ways.

Or how tribal medicine, and tropical diseases, are portrayed from a Western literary point of view, and whether that had an impact on defining the cultural meaning of disease in say the mother countries.
Hmm, OK, but those sound more like anthropological dissertations to me, to be honest...
What I meant was: if you want to look at how tropical illnesses / their treatments are portrayed in 19th-century literature and what that might say about colonialist attitudes, where does the 'change' bit come in?

Anyway, if you don't want to or don't have time to do very much primary reading, I think you may be shooting yourself in the foot a bit going for a topic like that. For that kind of topic I you'd need to do quite a lot of reading because tropical illnesses don't really feature all that prominently in English literature on the whole. So you'd probably have to wade through a lot of novels just to get to a handful of scenes that are actually relevant to your topic.

Reply 4

SilGathien

Original post by Mr Porter

My initial idea was to look at the idea of how medicine/disease/drugs changed from a postcolonial point of view but I'm drawing up blanks as to where to start my reading.

Original post by hobnob

What I meant was: if you want to look at how tropical illnesses / their treatments are portrayed in 19th-century literature and what that might say about colonialist attitudes, where does the 'change' bit come in?

Hobnob is right - you need an angle on the literary texts, and a specific focus for your dissertation which will allow you to explore the topic you have selected. If you still want to pursue the subject, you could always look at medical texts from the time (produced in England or elsewhere) either by themselves or in context with contemporary literature. The medicine texts might even be more useful and you could always analyse the discourse used in them from a literary perspective which might give you some insight into the topic you have selected.

Bear in mind that a topic on colonialism is quite theory based, and you may need to familiarise yourself with some of the key concepts and terms - there are plenty of anthologies and readers that have been published on the subject. And with regards to your topic, I don't know much about medicine and colonialism, but I do remember reading about the 'benefits' of the British empire on the treatment of disease in Niall Ferguson's Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World. Ferguson is no apologist for the Empire - quite the opposite in fact - and you can definitely make out his political angle and his ideological agenda from his account. This at least would provide you with some context, and Western angle on your topic if you choose to continue with it.

Your chosen fields also sound very interdisciplinary, so give medical humanities a quick Google as well, and you could find some interesting leads that way as well. Good luck!