Resource: Transitioning from high school to post-secondary education

Many students struggle with culture shock as they make the transition between high school and post-secondary education. New freedoms for many students living away from home for the first time also mean new responsibilities and stresses. To this end, teenmentalhealth.org has created their Transitions resource to provide students with information and support strategies. From their website:

“Transitions”, the first publication of its kind,  provides first-year students with information on topics including time management, relationships, sexual activity, mental illness, suicide and addictions. The guide also includes mental health self-help information and contains recommendations where students can go to get help on their campus. 

Free for download as .pdf in book or pocket (mobile) versions, instructors may be interested in sharing this resource with their students, or checking out their Resources for Educators.

Quick links:

• Transitions (book and pocket versions) for download
• teenmentalhealth.org website with additional resources and links
• Resources for Educators
• Resources for Parents
• Resources for Friends

Anthropologist, CTO

Is it really that strange to think that an anthropologist would be the best choice for a Chief Technology Officer?

According to Susannah Fox, the CTO for HHS (U.S. Health and Human Services), no, it shouldn't be:

“We’re living through this time right now where technology is a Trojan Horse for change ... . We say technology, but we mean innovation. We say interoperability and open data, but we mean culture change. And this is why the HHS CTO is an anthropologist. I know about culture change. I know how difficult it is for everyone involved.” (mobihealthnews.com, 2016)

For Fox, part of this cultural change has to do with understanding patients' needs, and the technology hacks that people are already doing, as in the #WeAreNotWaiting movement among people living with diabetes.

 Quick links & further reading:

• "HHS CTO: Technology in healthcare is a Trojan Horse for culture change" (mobihealthnews.com, 2016)
• "Why An Anthropologist, Not A Technologist Was The Best Choice For HHS CTO Role" (2016, Forbes)
• #WeAreNotWaiting via twitter
• Fox' blog post, "Love made visible" (2013) in which she reflects on her archaeology/ anthropology background and what this brings to her work in the healthcare sector.
• anthro everywhere's page, "Applying an anthropological perspective outside of university"

Cultural constructions of illness

"The Diseases You Only Get if You Believe in Them" (2016, The Atlantic) looks at certain forms of illness that are culturally specific. In this piece, Julie Beck interviews Frank Bures, author of The Geography of Madness: Penis Thieves, Voodoo Death, and the Search for the Meaning of the World’s Strangest Syndromes (2016).

Although Bures' book begins and ends with the 'exotic' cultural syndrome of penis theft in places like Nigeria and China, the interview provides a really interesting discussion of cultural syndromes in general, and asks "why the United States is not immune from them, and why asking if they’re “real” is the wrong question."

Some interesting points for discussion here include  the cultural imperialism and ethnocentrism of Western medical knowledge above understandings of health and illness in other cultures, and a critical reflection on how Western experiences of health/ illness are also culturally constructed.

Black Disabled Woman Syllabus

Vilissa Thompson, Disability Rights Consultant & Advocate, has created the Black Disabled Woman Syllabus in response to the lack of intersectionality she has seen in disability studies. In her work Thompson has found that many people "are ignorant of the experiences of Black Americans in general, Black women particularly, and when broken down further, Black disabled women specifically."

This syllabus, intended as a "living" document, currently provides a range of resources for educators and students on:

• Black Feminism / Womanism
• The Black Disabled Body & Identity
• Articles About Blackness, Feminism, &/or Disability
• Books about Blackness in America
• Fiction & Poetic Works
• Audio / Video
• Music

Additional links:

• Chronic Illness, Coping & Critiques: Writings of a Chronically Ill Anthropologist by Niki Thorne (York University) who has already shared and commented on Thompson's work and hashtag #DisabilityTooWhite (19 May 2016)
• Laurence Ralph's Renegade Dreams: Living Through Injury in Gangland Chicago (2015, University of Chicago Press) is an accessible ethnography that engages issues of race, (chronic) illness, and disability.