Mohan Dutta: Culture-Centered Approach

Culture. Identity. Politics. Health. Four different concepts and ideas and yet they are so intertwined. What is culture? Although this question may sound simple to many people, social scientists consider this to be one of the key questions in the field. Many social scientists have tried to define this in their own way, but have failed to come to any solid conclusion. Interestingly, I had this long debate with someone recently about how many people it needs to create a 'culture.' I agreed with the author (cannot remember the name right now) who said that it only takes two people to create a culture. But my 'opponent' did not agree with me and she resisted this notion of at least two people strongly. Her opinion was that such a concept can perhaps (and only) define a sub-culture, as those two people will have many things in common with other 'major' cultures. I tried to convince her that, just as Airhihenbuwa (2007) says, any culture cannot be entirely unique of ...

Increasingly, a new generation of health communication scholars are drawing our attention to the performative nature of health communication. In our experiences of health and illness; in our interactions with our loved ones in a variety of health contexts; in our interactions with healers and health care providers; in our sharing of our stories of health, illness, healing, and dying with others in our communities; in our participation in social and political processes that seek to address issues of healthcare, we continually perform ourselves. Performance in this sense is both public and private. We perform our selves in health communication interactions; and perform often for others, for the purposes of understanding, sharing, creating community and bringing about change. It is through our performances that we co-construct stories of health that articulate the violence inflicted by oppressive social structures, and suggest avenues for social change.