RE 214: Healing and Healthcare

Illness is a universal human experience and so is the desire to give meaning to illness. Nevertheless, cultural and religious differences can produce very different interpretations of the meaning and significance of illness for both individuals and those around them. In this course we will examine religiously-informed understandings of illness (of body, mind, and spirit) as well as the interpretative and healing strategies different cultures have developed to explain, address, and alleviate it. We will cover faith healing, Ayurveda, Traditional Chinese Medicine, shamanism and a variety of alternative ways of thinking about health and the human body in order to make sense of why people pursue non- Western biomedical forms of medicine. In addition, we will explore how different ways of healing raises questions about the differences between disease and illness, curing and healing, and religion and folk tradition.