The Durham Centre for Medical Humanities is pioneering in our active fostering of interdisciplinary dialogue with human geography. We are delighted to note the recognition given to human geography as practised in the United Kingdom by the recent International Benchmarking Review of UK Human Geography. Particular strengths of the field include conceptual innovation and the deep commitment to interdisciplinarity, both central concerns for the medical humanities. The report states that:
‘UK human geography is empirically and conceptually innovative, diverse, vibrant….In many sub-disciplines it is world leading, setting the intellectual agenda and providing articulate spokesperson and persuasive authors to present new knowledge and fresh conceptual insights.’
‘The field is radically interdisciplinary in its projects, partnerships, and publications; the geographical imagination seems inherently to cross boundaries. It absorbs new insights and is in a state of constant re-invention.’
Health geography, the area with which we at the Centre for Medical Humanities have been most engaged (see our posts here and details of international conference sessions organised here), was singled out for special mention:
‘This research area [health] was mentioned by several sub-disciplinary groups as vibrant, and a case where interdisciplinarity has added real strength to the old medical/epidemiological research model….. Health geographers have earned a very strong international reputation ….’
The following Durham geographers are members or affiliates of the Centre for Medical Humanities: Dr Felicity Callard, Dr Jennifer Laws, Dr Ben Anderson, Professor Peter Atkins, Professor Clare Bambra, Dr Rachel Colls, Professor Sarah Curtis, and Dr Paul Harrison. Dr Bethan Evans (University of Liverpool), Professor Christine Milligan (Lancaster University) and Dr David Conradson (University of Canterbury) are also former members or fellows of the CMH.
A summary of the report is available here, with the full report available here.