This course is designed to introduce students to medical anthropology and the theoretical approaches it draws from to parse and understand the myriad factors which influence health and well-being. Often working in tandem with organizations such as the WHO or the CDC, medical anthropologists address global health concerns, such as preventing the spread of infectious disease or preparing for the next pandemic threat. Their work is also relevant for improving patient care and health outcomes in hospitals, clinics, or a variety of informal health care settings. Insights gleaned from medical anthropological research into the effects of gender, race, and structural inequalities on health have also been used to more effectively treat patients and refine our understanding of the body. We will explore questions concerning suffering and pain, medicine’s role in shaping certain kinds of subjects, the inseparability of medicine and politics, and the relationship between government infrastructure and forms of health. How are state and health care regimes connected? Other questions we will investigate together include: how do we define health, sickness, disease, illness, and the body? What role do social or structural forces play in shaping or determining measures of health both individual and collective? How do we account for disparities in health, and what kinds of intersectional frameworks might we use to analyze the ways race, gender, sexuality, and disability create or contribute to inequitable health outcomes? Readings will draw from anthropology and related disciplines. We will focus on ethnographic texts that explore various experiences of, and ways of relating to, the body; epidemic and pandemic threats (Covid-19, HIV/AIDS, illnesses of zoonotic origin, as well as newer public health dangers such as loneliness and gun violence); reproductive justice and risk; medical humanitarianism; and access to pharmaceuticals.