11 19 Notes Welcome to Cancerland Notes Talks about breast cancer and the pink ribbon movement pink is a blnd color companies can brand themselves friends of the middle aged female market breast cancer provides a way of doing something for women without being a feminist Breast cancer pink culture is a perky cheerful culture Huge emphasis on the survivor culture but not much on those who pass away from the breast cancer movement Breast cancer has become a rite of passage movement Criticizes if raising money through runs and races are effective more to raise awareness since the money only covers the advertisement Sole effect of early detection is to stretch out the time in which woman bears the knowledge of her condition but most of that time is spent wasted on debilitating treatments and threat of death The term survivor bothers some people b c it denigrates the dead did the ones who live fight harder than those who died Are they braver or better Why is there no gracious acceptance of death Breast cancer is somewhat paternalistic in the sense that women are told to be little girls hugging the little teddy bears and let others take care of them too weak Hunt Reading Notes Strategic Suffering Illness Narratives as Social Empowerment among Mexican Cancer Patients Patients create narratives about their illness experience and that these stories fulfill certain social and psychological functions o Illness narratives may thus respond to the disruption of identity introduced by chronic illness by generating a strategically revised identity creating a new place in the social world that resolves conflicts and difficulties rooted in the broad context of the teller s life Chronic illnesses not only disrupt an individuals life biologically but the illness also creates social changes individual cannot continue living his normal life Serious chronic illness is different existential loss a break from the usual rhythm of life o People struggle to reconstruct a sense of continuity of self and role responsibilities performance of role Sexual politics and cervical cancer o Case study about a woman whose husband had sex with her 8 days after each child is delivered and she kept having miscarriages and pregnancies o She had her reproductive organs removed and thus used this as a resource into fealing with a long term conflict due to wifely role obligations of having sex Reconstructs her identity such that her rejection of her husband s advances is normalized and legitimized Family Obligation and Testicular Cancer o Man was singlehandedly supporting large family with limited resources develops testicular cancer that he thought if he removed he could now work harder and be better but instead the surgery made him weaker becomes a loss of strength and stamina and thus redefines his role in family His family now forgives him for being crippled he is able to fulfil Mexican expectations of trying to be a good son and man but ta the same time as a role release didn t have to change his identity b c he has an excuse Both case studies invented illness narratives that exempt them from participation in certain prescribed behaviors which prior to illness had proved untenable for them secondary gain the interpersonal advantages that result when one as the symptom of a physical disease including such things as increased attention from family members financial gain release from work social obligations o Patients may have ulterior motives that may underlie their failure to get well o The disempowered have ways to make the world better for them disempowered find and use whatever resources are available to them to gain some ability to deal with oppressive conditions LECTURE NOTES Sick Role Talcott Parsons in American culture The idea that if you have a small disease sick role can be sick for the appropriate amount of time and then must come back to what your usual role is but with cancer you are different o You give you the privileges given to the sick o The village of the sick when you get cancer you are transferred to this world where everyone has the same label o People s lives absolutely change Evolutionary medicine o Rapid raise in breast cancer can be due to evolutionary mis match menarche and reproduction differences between the hunter gatherers and current population o There are many multiple form of breast cancer not a homogenous disease o Breast cancer you get at 40 is different from 65 Etiology is different biologically different forms of how the cancer spreads or how it starts Technology o Mammograms are the most common some people think it can prevent cancer and some people think if you go you can t get cancer o Mammogram artificially extends your life compared to when you just waited for the symptoms o There is no formula as to what you can do to prevent and or get cancer o Previvors those who remove risk so that they can prevent cancer in the future Criticism as to who can have the power to actually have this power Cultures of Biomedicine o Medical personnel in Austria Demigods in white you do what the doctor says doctor is not here to hear what you think very passive system o Discourses of prevention there are campaigns in Europe that promote diet as a way to keep breasts healthy Inequality the highest mortalities o In the US there is inequality in US whites have the highest incidences but blacks have This is access to treatment stress best indicator is whether or not you have a car we think of cancer has the rich man Western disease chronic diseases happen after industrialization We have a long way to go when it comes to leveling the playing field for o Burden of breast cancer in Subsaharan African b c no one talks about it better access to healthcare Illness experience o Strategic suffering Based on the environment can subvert it by using cancer to avoid culturally defined ideas In Austria people use cancer as an excuse to cut people out of their lives and quit their jobs and change their lives women will confront the people they think caused them cancer and cut them out This redefines their social centers new identity Strategy to legitimize a new gender role o The word survivor is hated in Austria b c it has a stigma taking away the reality they don t want the burden of being playful and cheerful as someone valiantly fighting the disease medically and socially you are a survivor Even if you die later or something else you re still a breast cancer survivor o Nixon declares war on cancer Expectation of