Application deadline

Applicants from Nordic countries: 1 June for the autumn semester.

Applicants from outside the Nordic countries: 15 April for the autumn semester.

Type of course

Admission requirements

Course content

The course offers a theoretical framework for critical reflections of issues related to social and cultural aspects of health, illness, health care and preventive medicine.

The main topics are:

- Introduction to the study of public health, what it contains, how it is structured and its objectives.

- What creates health and illness? About medical and social determinants of health, with a focus on social determinants of health and how the health of the population is connected to social and political conditions in a society.

- Theories, perspectives and dilemmas in preventive medicine and health promotion.

- Social and geographical inequalities in health, what they look like, why they emerge, and how they can be reduced.

- Different perspectives on health and illness. The relationship between biomedical, cultural and subjective perspectives.

- Cultural perspectives on health and illness, related to three dimensions: cross-cultural differences, historical differences and differences between lay and professional perceptions.

- Modern western conceptions of health and illness and medicalisation, expressions, driving forces and implications.

- Cultural understandings of health professionals, their knowledge, practice and professional roles.

- Health care and preventive medicine as systems in various societies and their role in the welfare state.

Objectives of the course

Knowledge and understanding

- The course aims to show how perspectives and theories from different scientific disciplines form the scientific basis of all public health related work. The course is based on a multidisciplinary approach to the relationship between culture, society, public health, preventive medicine and health promotion, with a special focus on the cultural perspective.

- The student will obtain knowledge about factors that shape the health of a population, medical as well as social determinants.

- The student will learn to understand the relationship between health and society: Knowledge about the close relationship between health and society in different parts of the world, including knowledge about social and geographical inequalities in health: what they look like, why they emerge, and how they can be reduced.

Skills and competences

- The student will acquire knowledge about different health systems, as well as their place within other systems, such as the welfare state.

- The student will learn to think about conceptions of health and illness as culturally shaped phenomena with an interpretive rather than a given character, and to use this cultural perspective on health and illness to analyse the development of health care systems, preventive initiatives and health status in different societies.

General Proficiency

- During the course, the students are expected to obtain basic knowledge, skills and attitudes related to working with public health issues.

- The student will also attain proficiency about how professional knowledge and clinical practice are influenced by the cultural landscape where it is created and embedded; why professional knowledge, clinical practice and preventive medicine have normative elements, and why knowledge about the people and their culture is of vital importance for all who work with public health issues.

- Students will learn a basic attitude that involves respect for the intrinsic value of human beings, and tolerance for variations in the many different ways we live our lives.

Language of instruction and examination

Teaching methods

Assessment

Obligatory assignment: Home assignment (a written essay) on a given topic (2-3,000 words). The students will be given one week to write the home assignment. This paper is compulsory, and it can be written alone or two and two together. The home assignment should be handed in online. The assignment will be graded as approved or not approved. Attendance to lectures and seminars is mandatory.

Exam: The final exam consists of an individual take home exam on a given topic. The writing time is 1 week and the text should not exceed 2500 words including references. The exam is to be handed in online as specified in the exam text. Students must have delivered and gotten the obligatory assignment approved before taking the exam. Language: English. Grading scale: A-E equals passed, F equals failed.

If a student fails the course, an examination re-sit will be organised. Students with valid absence from the exam will be offered a re-scheduled examination. See examination regulations.

Recommended reading/syllabus