Kroppens förvandlingar

Hälsa, medicin och kulturell förändring i 1900-talets samhälle

Abstract

Alternative medical practices have expanded rapidly since the late 1960s. In the present article, this is viewed as one of the many cultural forms through which life-policy questions are brought onto the social and political agenda. It could be regarded as a metasocial commentart, on of the many arenas wherein people attempt to delineate another type of relationship between themselves and society. The emphasis is placed more upon "being" than on "becoming", a tendency which fits in well with the overall debate concerning identity-formation during the late modern era. The article further argues that during the first half of the century, ordinary or "school" medicine bore the Utopian message of a modern welfare society, a society in which there ought not exist any differences based on family, social background or financial status. The much-discussed "medicalization" had in fact much to say about matters such as equality and modernity.