This module examines medicine from the perspectives of social, cultural and gender history. It considers medicine as a culturally-embedded body of knowledge, a contested field of practice, and a significant source of gendered experience and perception. Students will be encouraged to develop a critical understanding of the theoretical and methodological approaches that inform the historical literature in this field. Case studies are mostly drawn from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but a few are from the twentieth century. Topics will vary from year to year, but will include most of the following: the nature of medical knowledge, the body in medical and social theory, illness and gender, gender and healing, professional identities, the history of the patient, doctor-patient relations, and the social construction of disease. The course consists of nine two-hour seminars and a hands-on introduction to using the resources of the Wellcome Library for the History of Medicine (London).