Dissertation Grant: Medical Technologies and Social Identities

这个项目将通过研究外科医生和患者如何使用手术来遵守和重新定义社会规范，来检查专业知识、技术和标准的交叉点。随着医疗技术的进步和对身体概念的改变，这项研究将记录在社会文化背景下通过选择性医疗程序对个体身体进行修改的机制。这项研究将提出改善患者和医生之间沟通的实用策略，并探索市场和医疗保健系统在多元文化背景下的影响。该项目建议对两个多元文化社区的外科手术进行人种学比较。通过对整形外科诊所临床接触的系统观察以及对外科医生和患者的采访，这项研究将调查外科医生和患者如何将特定的身体特征与群体认同联系起来，以及这对社区、医疗保健系统和医疗实践有何影响。这项研究将扩展(生物)医学中的分类和重新分类的理论；以及医疗技术和社会中不断变化的身体概念。

This project will examine the intersection of expertise, technology, and standards through a study of how surgeons and patients are using surgery to conform to and to redefine social norms. With advances in medical technologies and changing conceptions of the body, this study will document mechanisms of individual bodily modifications through elective medical procedures within a social-cultural context. This study will yield practical strategies for improving communication between patients and doctors and to explore the effects of markets and healthcare systems in multi-cultural contexts. The project proposes an ethnographic comparison of surgery in two multicultural communities. Through systematic observations of clinical encounters in cosmetic surgery clinics and interviews with surgeons and patients, the study will investigate how surgeons and patients are relating specific physical features to group identities and what the implications are for communities, healthcare systems and medical practices. This study will extend theorization on classification and re-classification in (bio)medicine; and medical technologies and changing conceptions of the body in society.