Call for abstracts: Symposium Medicine in the Balkans: ideas and practice to 1945

Thursday 24 January and Friday 25 January 2008

Venue: Central London

The chief objectives of this inaugural symposium are to explore the cultural and intellectual foundations of Balkan medical practices in the context of diverse national identities and heritage of the region; to discuss and develop approaches to history of medicine in the Balkans that are sensitive to the past but also speak to current issues. Topics will include:
Balkan perspectives on medical science - history, influences, transmission and diffusion of medical knowledge; Balkan medicine in practice - therapeutic traditions including folk medicine, professionalization and allopathic treatment; Healers and patients - language of illness, the oral tradition, gender in medicine, self-medication, medicalisation and doctor-patient relationships; Medicine in a national context - changing relationships between society and medical developments, emergence of professional health services; Medicine and religion - influences of diverse religious environments; Modern medical theory and practice - public health, social welfare and hygiene, medicine and eugenics.

If you are interested in giving a paper on any of these themes, please send an abstract of up to 300 words to the address below by 31 May 2007.