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Materialities of care: encountering health and illness through artefacts and architecture (CfA, 24th Sociology of Health and Illness Monograph)

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By CentreForMedicalHumanities.org Research Team | Last verified: September 2026

Research Summary: Materialities of Care Monograph

Category: Academic Call for Abstracts — Medical Sociology Research Monograph
Focus Areas: Material culture in health and social care; everyday artefacts, architecture, embodiment, and care practices
Publication Outlet: Sociology of Health and Illness Journal (24th Monograph) — dual publication as journal issue (February 2018) and book form
Submission Deadline: Abstract (600 words max) by 30 January 2016; Notification 1 March 2016; Draft paper (7,000 words) by 1 July 2016
Editors: Christina Buse, Daryl Martin, Sarah Nettleton (University of York)
Scope: Invites interdisciplinary papers examining how everyday objects, design, and architecture mediate health and illness experiences from perspectives of care providers, recipients, and designers
Key Themes: Relations between bodies and materialities; tacit and sensory knowing; ordering of care settings; material culture and identity; architectural influence on wellbeing narratives

Call for abstracts: Materialities of care: encountering health and illness through artefacts and architecture
Editors: Christina Buse, Daryl Martin, Sarah Nettleton (University of York)

Proposals are invited for the 24th Sociology of Health and Illness Monograph, which explores the role of material culture within health and social care encounters, including everyday objects, dress, interiors and architecture. Everyday artefacts actively mediate practices, identities and lived experiences of health and illness, prompting reflection on medical and care practices; professional status; social divisions and distinctions; and embodiment. Science and technology studies literature has drawn attention to materialities in medical practice (e.g., medical technologies, experimental materials and instrumentation), but more mundane aspects of material culture have received less conceptual attention.

We invite papers which use an analysis of everyday ‘things’ to engage with wider issues within medical sociology, as well as speaking to interdisciplinary literatures. Papers which consider the experience of care providers or those receiving care are welcomed, as are papers examining the perspective of designers and architects, who are not normally considered healthcare professionals, yet shape landscapes of care. In particular, submissions which add conceptual and empirical depth to discussions of materialities in health and social care are encouraged, as well as those which are reflexive about methods for capturing materialities. Possible themes include:

  • the relations between bodies, materialities and care
  • how things mediate embodied, tacit and sensory ways of knowing;
  • the ordering and management of materialities in health and social care settings;
  • the interaction of objects and artefacts with lived experiences and narratives of health and illness;
  • the relation of architectural and interior design to imaginings of health and well-being;
  • the interplay of material culture with identities, social divisions and distinctions.

The monograph will appear both as a regular issue of the journal and in book form, with the journal issue to be published in February 2018. Potential contributors should send an abstract of up to 600 words to Christina Buse, Daryl Martin and Sarah Nettleton by 30th January 2016. Name and institutional affiliation of the author(s) should also be supplied, including full contact details. We encourage international contributions, which will allow for cross-cultural comparison across the collection, as well as contributions from authors at a range of career stages, from early career to more established writers. Informal email enquiries prior to submission can be sent to any of the editors. Abstracts will be reviewed and potential authors notified by 1st March 2016.

Short-listed authors will be invited to submit a draft paper of 7,000 words by 1st July 2016. Submissions will be refereed in the usual way and should follow the journal’s style guidelines.

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