The Northeast Popular/American Culture Association (NEPCA) is soliciting papers for topics in the area of Health, Disease, Illness and Culture for its annual meeting, which will be held October 30-31 at Colby-Sawyer College, New London, New Hampshire.
SUBMISSION DEADLINE: JUNE 15, 2015
Topics in Health, Disease and Culture may include such themes as below:
- Mass media and the framing of health, disease, and illness in popular and American culture in press, advertising, film, television, social media, etc.
- Framing of 21st century and historical popular press and/or social media coverage of vaccines and epidemics (e.g., ebola, measles, avian flu)
- Discourse about patients and health professional relationships, professionalism, interprofessional collaboration, and the place of healthcare humanities (health humanities, medical humanities) in health education
- Public policy discourses about health institutions and health care reform, (e.g., Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, medical homes, community health centers, hospitals, social determinants of health, mental health, obesity, food politics, smoking, occupational health)
- Narratives of epidemic, pandemic, emerging infectious diseases; sexually transmitted diseases; chronic diseases/illnesses
- Narratives on climate change and health, water scarcity and access
- Race, ethnicity, gender, class, or place/environmental interpretations of disease, health, and illness
- Narratives of illness from patient and health practitioner perspectives in novels, short stories, poems, memoirs, graphic comics, etc., discussed in larger sociocultural (ethnicity, race, gender, class), and political (health care system) contexts.
- Historical and contemporary perspectives in popular and America culture on such topics as the promotion of health through diet, exercise, or nutritional products; personal, domestic, or public hygiene; antibiotic drug resistance; alternative health practices
Both individual papers and complete panels (with individual forms, paper abstracts, one-page CVs, paper titles, and panel title in the cases of complete panels submissions) are considered. The deadline for submission of proposals is June 15, 2015. NEPCA Fall Conference information, including the paper proposal form, can be found online.
Please submit the above information to the 2015 NEPCA Program Chair, Kraig Larkin and to Jennifer Tebbe-Grossman, Area Chair for Health, Disease and Culture.