Doctoral Dissertation Research: Translation, Scientization, and Branding in Medical Markets

博士论文研究：医疗市场的翻译、科学化和品牌化

• 批准号: 2017457
• 负责人: Sonia Das
• 金额: $ 2.51万
• 依托单位: New York University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-01-01 至 2022-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2017457&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Translation; Scientization

Natural products, broadly sourced from plants and animal parts, are consumed worldwide to enhance general health and well-being. A lucrative industry that manufactures and sells natural products as medicines and dietary supplements increasingly relies on scientific evidence of these products’ medical effectiveness as communicated by medical professionals, scientists, marketers, and government agencies in official reports and routine conversations. This linguistic anthropological dissertation project investigates how scientific research on the effectiveness of natural products is translated into everyday language to market their therapeutic properties. Research findings will be disseminated to medical professionals in the pharmaceutical industry, scientific academies, government agencies, and NGOs who seek to educate about scientific literacy to help the public make informed decisions about the consumption of natural products. The research will further aid policy makers in introducing and regulating natural products in national health care systems. The research investigate how scientific terminologies and language are used to brand natural products as effective medicine and communicate their value in different national and global medical markets. The researcher will carry out linguistic and ethnographic research in farms, laboratories, and marketplaces where natural products are cultivated, manufactured, studied, and marketed to consumers. Using the methods of participant observation to study work activities, semi-structured interviews, analyzing scientific papers, and media and archival research, the researcher will examine how networks between the government, the farming industry, scientists, pharmaceutical companies, and consumers facilitate communication about the scientific properties of natural products. The results of this research will contribute to anthropological theories about science’s role in shaping social institutions, government, and global markets, by providing empirical data on the use of language in creating scientific evidence.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

天然产品广泛来自植物和动物部分，全世界都在消费，以增进一般健康和福祉。一个利润丰厚的行业生产和销售天然产品作为药品和膳食补充剂，越来越依赖于这些产品的医疗效果的科学证据，由医疗专业人员、科学家、营销人员和政府机构在官方报告和日常对话中传达。这个语言人类学论文项目调查了关于天然产品有效性的科学研究如何被翻译成日常语言来推销它们的治疗特性。研究成果将传播给制药行业的医疗专业人员、科学院、政府机构和非政府组织，他们寻求进行科学素养教育，以帮助公众对天然产品的消费做出明智的决定。这项研究将进一步帮助政策制定者在国家医疗保健系统中引入和监管天然产品。这项研究调查了科学术语和语言如何被用来将天然产品标记为有效的药物，并在不同的国家和全球医疗市场传达其价值。研究人员将在种植、制造、研究和向消费者销售天然产品的农场、实验室和市场进行语言和人种学研究。研究人员将运用参与观察、半结构访谈、科学论文分析、媒体和档案研究等方法，考察政府、农业、科学家、制药公司和消费者之间的网络如何促进关于天然产品科学特性的交流。这项研究的结果将通过提供关于在创造科学证据时使用语言的经验数据，为关于科学在塑造社会机构、政府和全球市场中的作用的人类学理论做出贡献。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。