Synopses & Reviews
The most dramatic growth of Christianity in the late twentieth century has occurred in Africa, where Catholic missions have played major roles. But these missions did more than simply convert Africans. Catholic sisters became heavily involved in the Churchandrsquo;s health services and eventually in relief and social justice efforts. Inand#160;
Into Africa, Barbra Mann Wall offers a transnational history that reveals how Catholic medical and nursing sisters established relationships between local and international groups, sparking an exchange of ideas that crossed national, religious, gender, and political boundaries.
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Both a nurse and a historian, Wall explores this intersection of religion, medicine, gender, race, and politics in sub-Saharan Africa, focusing on the years following World War II, a period when European colonial rule was ending and Africans were building new governments, health care institutions, and education systems. She focuses specifically on hospitals, clinics, and schools of nursing in Ghana and Uganda run by the Medical Mission Sisters of Philadelphia; in Nigeria and Uganda by the Irish Medical Missionaries of Mary; in Tanzania by the Maryknoll Sisters of New York; and in Nigeria by a local Nigerian congregation. Wall shows how, although initially somewhat ethnocentric, the sisters gradually developed a deeper understanding of the diverse populations they served. In the process, their medical and nursing work intersected with critical social, political, and cultural debates that continue in Africa today: debates about the role of women in their local societies, the relationship of women to the nursing and medical professions and to the Catholic Church, the obligations countries have to provide care for their citizens, and the role of women in human rights.
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A groundbreaking contribution to the study of globalization and medicine, Into Africa highlights the importance of transnational partnerships, using the stories of these nuns to enhance the understanding of medical mission work and global change.
Review
andquot;Everybody who cares about health and social justice, internationally and in the U.S., should read this book!andquot;
Review
andquot;This wonderful book offers a deeply reflective look at the motivations, ideology, and outcomes of this critical work, telling the stories of true heroes and heroines of American medicine and public health. It is must reading for anyone contemplating international health activism today.andquot;
Review
andquot;Comrades in Health is a pioneering effort, a major addition to the study of global public health, and a new perspective on U.S. domestic health policy.andquot;
Review
andquot;Birn and Brown describe the history of international efforts to improve the health of vulnerable populations as an inherently sociopolitical, leftist, and often communist, endeavor. [The editors] create a coherent picture of the development of international health efforts...and will be an interesting read for more advanced students of public health and political science. Recommended.andquot;
Review
andquot;The most haunting lesson in this fine book stems from its call for an ethic of social consciousness in health care work. In this view, the struggle of justice for all is integral to the improvement of individual health outcomes, and it is as fraught with uncertainty and unintended consequences as is the treatment of individual illness. Birn, Brown and their colleagues update an old social medicine lesson that makes this struggle, with its risks, penuries and triumphs, a core professional duty instead of merely a morally praiseworthy individual pursuit.andquot;
Review
andquot;a captivating journey through the political, economic, and social turmoil that embroiled global health care during the 20th century.andquot;
Review
andquot;Perhaps the most interesting lesson in Comrades in Health is in showing how the very term socialised medicine came to be such an imagined existential threat to the US body politic.andquot;
Review
This lyrical book offers an intimate view of the role of community leadership in the creation of health centers, one of the most important chapters in the history of U.S. health policy for the medically underserved. Bonnie Lefkowitz's examination of health centers and community leadership should be required reading in public health leadership programs everywhere.
Review
andquot;Comrades in Health is important reading for those interested in the global debate surrounding the post-2015 global developmental agenda and future reform of the UN-centric humanitarian system required to address 21st-century human security and social justice.andquot;
Review
andldquo;A particularly striking exploration of the interplay between religion, health, gender, and politics. Walland#39;s work enriches and challenges existing perspectives on the development of health care in sub-Saharan Africa, andand#160;provides an essential historical link between the colonial period and the present day.andquot;
Synopsis
Since the early twentieth century, politically engaged and socially committed U.S. health professionals have worked in solidarity with progressive movements around the world. Often with roots in social medicine, political activism, and international socialism, these doctors, nurses, and other health workers became comrades who joined forces with people struggling for social justice, equity, and the right to health.
Anne-Emanuelle Birn and Theodore M. Brown bring together a group of professionals and activists whose lives have been dedicated to health internationalism. By presenting a combination of historical accounts and first-hand reflections, this collection of essays aims to draw attention to the longstanding international activities of the American health left and the lessons they brought home. The involvement of these progressive U.S. health professionals is presented against the background of foreign and domestic policy, social movements, and global politics.
Synopsis
Since the early twentieth century, politically engaged and socially committed U.S. health professionals have worked in solidarity with progressive movements around the world. Often with roots in social medicine, political activism, and international socialism, these doctors, nurses, and other health workers became comrades who joined forces with people struggling for social justice, equity, and the right to health.
Anne-Emanuelle birn and Theodore M. Brown bring together a group of professionals and activists whose lives have been dedicated to health internationalism. By presenting a combination of historical accounts and first-hand reflections, this collection of essays aims to draw attention to the longstanading international activities of the American health left and the lessons they brought home. The involvement of these progressive U.S. health professionals is presented against the background of foreign and domestic policy, social mvoements, and global politics.
Synopsis
The aftermath of Hurricane Katrina has placed a national spotlight on the shameful state of healthcare for America's poor. In the face of this highly publicized disaster, public health experts are more concerned than ever about persistent disparities that result from income and race.
This book tells the story of one groundbreaking approach to medicine that attacks the problem by focusing on the wellness of whole neighborhoods. Since their creation during the 1960s, community health centers have served the needs of the poor in the tenements of New York, the colonias of Texas, the working class neighborhoods of Boston, and the dirt farms of the South. As products of the civil rights movement, the early centers provided not only primary and preventive care, but also social and environmental services, economic development, and empowerment.
Bonnie Lefkowitz-herself a veteran of community health administration-explores the program's unlikely transformation from a small and beleaguered demonstration effort to a network of close to a thousand modern health care organizations serving nearly 15 million people. In a series of personal accounts and interviews with national leaders and dozens of health care workers, patients, and activists in five communities across the United States, she shows how health centers have endured despite cynicism and inertia, the vagaries of politics, and ongoing discrimination.
Synopsis
Inand#160;
Into Africa, Barbra Mann Wall offers a transnational history that explores the intersection of religion, medicine, gender, race, and politics in sub-Saharan Africa, focusing on the years following World War II. The book highlights the importance of transnational partnerships, using the stories of four groups of European and American nuns to enhance our understanding of medical mission work and global change.
About the Author
BARBRA MANN WALL is an associate professor of nursing at the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia, where she is also the associate director of the Barbara Bates Center for the Study of the History of Nursing. She is the author ofand#160;
American Catholic Hospitals: A Century of Changing Markets and Missions (Rutgers University Press).
Table of Contents
List of Figures
Foreword
Acknowledgments
Part I
1. Introduction: Health Comrades, Abroad and at Home
2. The Making of Health Internationalists
Part II
3. The Perils of Unconstrained Enthusiasm
4. American Medical Support for Spanish Democracy, 1936andndash;1938
5. Medical McCarthyism and the Punishment of Internationalist Physicians in the United States
Part III
6. Contesting Racism and Innovating Community Health Centers
7. Barefoot in China, the Bronx, and Beyond
8. Medical Internationalism and the andldquo;Last Epidemicandrdquo;
Part IV
9. Social Medicine, at Home and Abroad
10. Find the Best People and Support Them
11. Cooperantes, Solidarity, and the Fight for Health in Mozambique
12. From Harlem to Harare
Part V
13. Brigadistas and Revolutionaries
14. Health and Human Rights in Latin America, and Beyond
15. History, Theory, and Praxis in Pacific Islands Health
16. Doctors for Global Health
17. Doctors Across Blockades
Part VI
18. Across the Generations
Notes on Contributors
Index