Sociological Knowledge and Understanding of Contemporary Health Issues - Essay Example

Sociology HANUMANTH REDDY.NEMALI How valuable is sociological knowledge in contributing to our understanding of contemporary health issues? INTRODUCTION Sociological thinking has had a major part to play in the questioning of medical knowledge. In certain respects, it appears that the sociology of health and illness is a sceptical response to, as well as the analysis of the usually seen medical model of health and illness (Walsh 34). For thinking sociologically regarding the biomedical science there is a requirement of comprehending the emergence of it as well as the dominance culturally and historically. If this is done we would be able to more properly understand the contemporary significance that it holds in the health field. BODY The case study in question involves the experience of a nuclear family migrated to Australia: Kadhem, his wife Amira and their three children. Being the only breadwinner, Kadhem has good qualification, high salary and social status in hometown. Having no knowledge of problems in Australia, the family migrates and he remains unemployed due to overseas qualification and foreign experience. Kadhem’s family belongs to those socio-economic disadvantaged groups that are more likely to risk their health as a result of social class behaviour. There is neither income nor savings. Here the idea of income as the most vital health predictor comes. Children are of school-going age, Amira wants to earn and Kadhem has no option but to let her. The job of cleaner enables Amira to pay only rent and essential bills. With burdens of job and home there is the problem of double day. Double day refers to the women working during day time and then also having to deal with the domestic labour. This leads to a major effect on the health of the women. Other than this there is also dissatisfaction with job. Amira becomes homesick which may be due to the cultural conflicts that she may be facing. She might be missing her hometown and the culture of that place. Staying in a new land she would have to deal with the people of a foreign culture. Human behaviour is partly determined by the organization of society and social factors (age, ethnicity, education, employment, etc.), and imposed by social practices. Quality of life is defined by the access to resources and their availability. Analysing this case from macro perspective will help in giving a sociological interpretation of adjacent issues of ethnicity, employment, education, gender, stratification, health and illness, and social class and social status in social structure. ‘Sociological thinking is, one might say, a power in its own right, an anti-fixating power. It renders flexible again the world hitherto oppressive in its apparent fixity; it shows it as a world which could be different from what it is now (Bauman 16).’ Sociology is the science of human issues - a study of human society (Stephens and Leach 1). The science is not about solving some issue but to point out the root cause and to suggest solutions. Willis and Elmer claim that social factors are not innate, society ascribes them in one way or another and interpretations are not fixed. ‘Sociology is concerned with the unequal distribution of power and seeks to uncover the effects of this on social life. Understanding social ideas, social structures and power relations enables the exploration of how social life is not fixed and unchanging but was different in the past, varies in different culture and social settings, and will be different in the future’ (Willis and Elmer 3). Kadhem’s health is disturbed as he is shifted down in social structure. He has lost status not only with regard to class, but also his gender role: his cultural background leads him to believe part of his role as a male is as the family breadwinner. Gender is one’s social definition. ‘Gender constructions are not static – our gendered identities are produced, performed and reproduced in interaction with others’ (Willis and Elmer 86). Sociology helps in identifying one’s place in social structure, and this placement defines self. The problem with Kadhem and Amira is their social status that is lowest in social hierarchy, their placement is marginal and their class is of disadvantaged migrants with less life chances - ‘chances that individuals and groups have of obtaining those things defined as desirable in their society, such as wealth, power, and prestige’ (Van Krieken, et al. 214). A migrant feels like a square peg in a round hole, but the issue is not only of structural inequality. Identity of a person in a new social context is also in question. Socio-economic disadvantaged groups experience more ill health and are more likely to engage in risky or harmful health-related behaviour (Turrell et al. 177). Occupation partly determines one’s social status and people like Kadhem, due to their incomplete education and language problems, are more vulnerable to illness. ‘The distribution of health and illness, when described in terms of measurable variations in health status between social groups, is referred to as health inequality (Keleher and Murphy 5). Sociological imagination by Wright Mills (1959) finds the connection between the individual experience and its social occurrence. The roots of issues like health and illness can be traced back to wider social forces (Thomas 7), such as social class, stratification, social issues, culture, ethnicity, gender, etc. We have traced these elements in Kadhem family’s narrative. In a nuclear family when the power of one (man) is threatened or challenged by the growth of the other (female), health get infected with the haunting feeling of financial dependence and circumstantial helplessness. In patriarchal or orthodox societies women’s participation is limited to the premises of household. Such a woman feels exhausted when she, assigned with tough indoor and outdoor duties and low wages, as a peripheral member enters in a new society. ‘Health is a result of structural inequality. Illness is influenced by poor living and working conditions, poverty, discrimination, lack of educational and employment opportunities, nutrition, housing, income and savings’ (Willis and Elmer 84). Sense of self is defined by one’s interaction and interpretation of experience with others. The sense of self in this case is hurt by the society which socially discriminates, limits occupational opportunities and reduces social interactions. Kadhem may have heard a lot about the opportunities of Australia but interaction with social institutions has proved otherwise. All issues revolve around unemployment of Kadhem and low income of Amira which proves income as most potent socio-economic and health determinant. The issue of these migrants can also be explained by the work of Erving Goffman on stigma that highlights the reasons and experience of health and illness (Giddens and Griffiths 269). The work helps in understanding mental illness, sexually transmitted infections and disabilities by identifying that stigmatising some illness, group or person results in spoiled identity. Social Stratification refers to the hierarchical arrangement of people in a society (Andersen and Taylor 212). The family in focus is suffering from Objective Poverty due to low income which refrain them from availing basic facilities. The stratification of society determines one’s status by wealth and income, social class, ethnicity, gender, political status and religion. The bourgeois class ensures to maintain the social inequality by factors like income, wealth and social connections as per Marxism. By the virtue of social institution, the migrants are intentionally deprived of the benefits which an aboriginal can secure. The results of poverty are loss of status and income, felling of social alienation, falling health and declining self esteem, all exist in the case. The unemployed migrants have worst health due to mental stress, lack of care and exercise. The question is not only of income, it is of adjustment. Willis and Elmer explain migrants’ health culturally and structurally. Cultural approach associates illness with cultural changes like diet and climate where structural approach highlights the practitioners’ inability to understand the difference of a migrant’s experience and cause of his illness. Biomedicine can diagnose anxiety, but such treatment is unable to deal with the causes of illness that are discrimination, social isolation, no acknowledgment, financial insecurity, cultural transition, lack of social services (English language teaching) and institutional exploitation. Developed countries have progressed in health but efforts are unequally distributed. Differentiating people on ethnicity leads to racism. ‘Racism can be both overt through targeted acts and expressions against individuals or groups, or it can be covert less obvious or hidden, and occurring through systematic exclusion of specific individuals and groups based on their ethnicity (Willis and Elmer 93). 52 percent of Australian population growth is from net overseas migration (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2004a). Such a large number of immigrants ask for better regulations. Person should be cured from the disease and its cause. Practitioners can help patents in changing their perceptions. Practitioners and nurses can extend their vision with sociological thinking. Social factors are not innate will help in overcoming the trauma and in redefining circumstances. CONCLUSION Bauman considers sociological thinking as an enlightening exercise which by making us sensitive explores the evident yet latent part and parcel of the social life which shapes human resources and human power (Bauman 16). The art of sociological thinking bestows us with the power of flexibly going through social oppression. An increased knowledge of society will enhance our capability to bear the pressure of social groups, social cultures, and social structure in a constructive way. Bauman suggests sociological thinking as a solution to make individual less manipulable, more resilient to oppression and regulation from outside, more likely to resist being fixed by forces that claim to be irresistible. In conclusion, sociological knowledge enables to broaden one’s perspective on contemporary issues. By the help of sociological thinking, symbolic interactionism, structuralism, culturalism, social constructionism, social imagination, feminism, Marxism and other theories health-workers are suggested to deal migrants as more vulnerable to illness and morbidity. Along with the understanding of social structure and health, a health-worker must know ‘how vulnerable and most disadvantaged people of any society are affected by exposure to adverse determinants’ (Keleher and Murphy, 5). References Andersen, Margaret, and Howard Francis Taylor, Sociology: understanding a diverse society. Florence, KY: Cengage Learning, 2005. Bauman, Zygmunt, Thinking Sociologically, Basil Blackwell, Cambridge, 2001. Giddens, Anthony and Simon Griffiths, Sociology, 5th ed. Stafford BC: Polity, 2006. Odum W. Howard, Social Forces: Sociology in the Contemporary World of Today and Tomorrow, Vol. 21, University of North Carolina Press (May, 1943). Stephens, Paul, and Andrew Leach. Think Sociologically. Cheltenham: Nelson Thornes, 1998. Thomas, Richard, Society and health: sociology for health professionals, Springer, 2003. Willis, Karen and Shandell Elmer, Society, Culture and Health: an introduction to sociology of nurses, Oxford University press, South Melbourne, 2007. Walsh, Mark. Introduction to sociology for health carers. Gloucestershire: Nelson Thornes, 2004. Read More