This book establishes the voice of medical sociology in key debates in the social sciences. Concerning modernity, postmodernity, structuralism and poststructuralism issues covered include:
* disease and medicine in postmodern times
* gender, health and the feminist debate on the postmodern
* ageing, the lifecourse and the sociology of health and ageing
* medicine and complementary medicine
* death in postmodernity.
List of contributors, Introduction, 1 Postmodernity and health, 2 The promise of postmodernism for the sociology of health and medicine, 3 Medical sociology and modernity: reflections on the public sphere and the roles of intellectuals and social critics, 4 Issues at the interface of medical sociology and public health, 5 Explaining health inequalities: how useful are concepts of social class?, 6 Gender, health and the feminist debate on postmodernism, 7 In search of the 'missing body': pain, suffering and the (post) modern condition, 8 Ageing, the lifecourse and the sociology of embodiment, 9 Risk, governmentality and the reconceptualization of citizenship, 10 Medicine and complementary medicine: challenge and change, 11 Postmodern adventures of life and death, Index
