Imagining Health: Medicine, Social Protest, and Modern American Literature

A surprising look at how American writers envision a more equitable healthcare system In the United States, a deep suspicion of professional medical expertise is becoming increasingly prominent.Meanwhile, many arguments for health justice take a highly critical view of medical authority, even rejecting it entirely.In the early to mid-twentieth century, alternatively, as medicine rapidly professionalized, Americans came to hold the medical establishment in a particularly high regard, while many saw how it could play a crucial role in progressive politics.In this period, technologies developed, specializations grew, and medical education became standardized.With this process came inequities, as marginalized populations struggled to access the highest levels of care.Literary writers confronting social ills through their work included critiques of this new system in their writing, Ira Halpern argues.Without abandoning professional medicine, they called for alternative systems of care that