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Topics in History: Cancer Archives: How Disease Makes History

A vintage poster with muted yellows and blues featuring a rooster squawking at the rising sun with text that reads: early is the watchword; cancer control; early diagnosis, early treatment will save many lives; early cancer can be cured

This course will introduce students to the cultural history of medicine by using the scholarly and popular literature generated by experiences of cancer in the modern world. Students will explore how disease makes history in two senses. First, we will scrutinize the vast cultural production generated by experiences of disease and consider how these materials might help us reimagine the medical historical archive. Second, going beyond the history of medicine, we will study how cancer shapes, and in turn is shaped by, the history of gender, race, capitalism, colonialism, technology, and the environment. Assigned materials include scholarly monographs, articles, autobiographies, graphic novels, documentaries, and photographs. 

Department of History, Queen's University

49 Bader Lane, Watson Hall 212
Kingston ON K7L 3N6
Canada

Phone

Please note that the Department of History phone line is not monitored at all times. Please leave a voicemail or email hist.undergrad@queensu.ca and we will contact you as soon as we can.

Undergraduate

Graduate

Queen's University is situated on traditional Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe territory.