Background:
Disease stratification practices have long been used as a means to produce and make sense of cancer, distinguishing ‘types’, tumour development stages, and even patients’ sociodemographic profiles. However, interest in stratification; that is, the process of dividing oncology populations into clinically meaningful subtypes, has been re-invigorated by two recent developments in medicine and healthcare. First, an increased awareness of …
We know that illness can be narrated but can it be shown?
Feminist artists have been amongst the first to show the sick female body. Jo Spence used photography during the 1980s to document her breast cancer diagnosis and the impact of the treatments on her body. Spence’s projects, such as “The Picture of Health?” and “Narratives of Disease,” have …
Nothing seems to be more self-evident than gender differences, and yet when we have to establish what these differences are, things seem to become complicated. Is it the reproductive system that clearly determines if we love pink or blue? Perhaps it is the endocrine system? Or is it the genes that are different?
Feminist research started decades ago to build …
by Alberto Prunetti
Edizioni Alegre, 2014, 192 pages.
Amianto. Una storia operaia (Asbestos. A Working-Class Story) is written by Alberto Prunetti, an Italian writer who has published fiction and non-fiction since 2003. The book was originally published in 2012[i] and narrates the life of a factory worker, Renato Prunetti, the author’s father. Renato’s …
Mammographies
The Cultural Discourses of Breast Cancer Narratives
University of Michigan Press, 2013. 258 pages
Breast cancer is one of the leading causes of death among women and an increasing number of women nowadays live with the disease. How do breast cancer patients represent their experiences, and what potential for representation is afforded by the …