Many times when people ask me why I am an anthropologist, and why I chose anthropology as a major because 'what are you going to do with that?'... i do not entirely know how to answer them. I usually just say something like "because I love it" and leave it at that. Lately, I have been thinking a lot about my path in life and the effect this education is having on who I am. With all this thought I have concluded why I love anthropology so much and why this Field Study is going to change my life. Anthropology is the study of human beings (contrary to what some people may think, I am NOT getting an education to manage the store Anthropologie). With that study of human beings comes theory, data, methods... an attempt to understand the motives behind why they act the way they do and how that influences them as a person and extends to their community, their society, and thus...envelops the culture through which they live their lives. Culture for me is more than just what influences their daily activities and character. It is the way one breaths. It is the way they eat, dance, think, dress, love, feel, speak, play, sing... it is the way a person defines who they are.
One of the reasons that I am so excited about my project is because I will have the opportunity to interact with human beings who have grown up in a completely different culture than my own. People who have had entirely different experiences because of where they live on this earth. But what makes me so excited is thinking about how despite all our differences, we will still be so similar. So far, my project description is this:
Project Description
The ultimate goal of this project is to see if gender affects the way healthcare is administered by traditional healers and biomedical doctors when a patient is infected with malaria in Wiamoase, Ghana. Since the healthcare situation around the world is one which is ever changing as new developments surface and new conclusions are made, new research is needed to keep up with the rapidly evolving field. Thus, my research will contribute to the larger theoretical effort of medical anthropology and socio-cultural anthropology. Malaria is a disease, rather an epidemic which is prominent in many countries today, including Ghana. I will not be researching the disease itself but rather the way gender affects doctor-patient interactions when one is infected with the disease. Since there are many different factors which could influence the way a traditional healer or biomedical doctor treats a patient, I have chosen to hone in on gender so that results will be more easily isolated. In order to carry out this study and attain useful results, I will employ several methods to collect my data. Primarily, I will be video-recording interactions between doctors and patients as I will be seeking to discover whether gendered differences can be identified through observation of interaction between patient and healer. I will also shadow select traditional healers and doctors at the Salvation Army Clinic and observe the way they diagnose malaria and administer treatment. This will help me to better understand the experiences patients are having and see from the healthcare administrator’s point of view how/if gender plays a role in their practices. Furthermore, my research can impact the gendered healthcare discourses in the medical field right now and give doctors as well as patients a better understanding of the outcome of gender differences. By utilizing these methods I hope to gain knowledge and statistical analysis which will help me add to the larger theoretical perspective.
With this study, I hope to not only learn and apply theory and methods and data to add to the general anthropological discourse and more specifically, the medical discourse...but I hope to learn about these people for myself. I hope to come to understand their culture and in doing so, understand IF that affects gender differences among healthcare administration behaviors. Throughout this experience I expect I will indirectly learn more about myself in understanding more about other human beings who live across the world. I am so excited to become immersed in their culture. To learn to think and act as they do in order to ultimately understand more about God's children. In the end, that is my main goal.
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