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ILLNESS and its REPRESENTATIONS.
RUTTOPUISTO/ PEST PARK, HELSINKI
Edmund Leach has noted that a sign is always a member of a set of
contrasted signs which function within a specific cultural context. That
is, we know about "Light" in the presence of its absence: "Darkness."
Something of the sort happens in Ruttopuisto/Pest Park, Helsinki. No
gravestones, no monuments, just a single plate in Finnish and another in
Swedish casually remind the passer-by of a different ear, of the long gone
fears...
Until the 1980's the promise of modern science and technology seemed to
have eradicated these fears. But the "terror of pest" laid dormant in our
subconscious, only to be awakened by the appearance of HIV and other
illnesses. There are many Pest Parks scattered all over the world. The most
significant, however, may be found inside our mind.
Lily Díaz
BIO POWER AND THE SOCIAL EXTENSIONS OF ILLNESS
I am interested in the social history of illness. Michel Foucalt is one of
the most essential resources for analysis of this area. This is because
Foucalt has studied the history of madness, sexuality, and knowledge, in
relation to the power structures of society. I am also interested in how,
throughout history, literature has represented what is normal and what is
not. How at points poverty and illness have been regarded as synonymous,
and how illness has quite often been represented through sexual illness, as
is the case with AIDS.
Hanna Holm
IN SICKNESS AND HEALTH
Disease and illness, as well as health, has interested me for several years
now. My focus has mainly been how illnesses affect women: Why are women
treated differently than men by doctors? Who is in control of women's
bodies? Why are most diagnostics based on research done on men and then
merely applied to women, without regards to physiological differences? Why,
historically, so-called difficult women been diagnosed as hysterical by
male doctors? What is health? Who is healthy? Why is health taken for
granted?
KirsiMarja Metsähuone