Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
Buenos Aires psychoanalysts resisting imperialism. Brazilian parasitologists embracing communism as an antidote to rural misery. Nicaraguan revolutionaries welcoming Cuban health cooperation. Chilean public health reformers gauging domestic approaches against Soviet and Western counterparts. These and accompanying accounts--as explored in Peripheral Nerve--problematize existing understandings of how the Cold War unfolded in Latin America, generally and in health and medical realms. Bringing together scholars from across the Americas, this volume chronicles the experiences of Latin American physicians, nurses, medical scientists, and reformers who interacted with dominant US and European players and sought alternative channels of health and medical solidarity with the Soviet Union and via South-South cooperation. Throughout, Peripheral Nerve highlights how Latin American health professionals accepted, rejected, and adapted foreign involvement; manipulated the rivalry between the United States and the USSR; and forged local variants that they projected internationally. In so doing, this collection reveals the multivalent nature of Latin American health politics, offering a significant contribution to Cold War history.
Contributors. Cheasty Anderson, Anne-Emanuelle Birn, Katherine E. Bliss, Gilberto Hochman, Jennifer L. Lambe, Nicole Pacino, Carlos Henrique Assun o Paiva, Jadwiga E. Pieper Mooney, Ra l Necochea L pez, Marco A. Ramos, Gabriela Soto Laveaga