Stories of Illness and Healing

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Course Title

Stories of Illness and Healing

Course Description

This course explores narrative techniques and representational strategies (such as metaphors and visual aspects of graphic illustration) in stories about illness and healing by diverse writers. Through readings in a range of genres (drama, poetry, short stories, memoirs and personal essays, and graphic memoirs) we will examine, on one hand, how illness and healing experiences are structured and circulated as stories embedded in specific cultural worldviews, and, on the other, how stories mediate the socially diverse experiences of illness and healing. In other words, illness/healing are shaped by language and story, and stories partly shape illness and healing processes. You will learn basic techniques of narrative analysis, including close reading skills, in order to interpret texts such as Edson, W;t; Small, Stitches; Meri Danquah, Willow Weep for Me; Forney, Marbles; short stories; and the self- and cultural-examination essays in On Immunity.

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Disciplinary Perspectives

Geographic Location

Oswego NY

Instructional Modality

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Title

Stories of Illness and Healing