University College Dublin

This innovative MA programme enables you to critically engage with debates in welfare and medical history in the modern period, within Ireland and internationally. Themes include eugenics; migration; institutionalisation and patients’ experiences, analysed through social, gender, class and post-colonial history.
-The MA has a reputation for excellence taught by lecturers with international profiles.
-Modules are taught through seminars. You will develop expertise in presenting, analytical thinking, effective communication, and writing with clarity and precision.
-The dissertation, at the core of the MA, allows you to engage your own research-based interests.

Medicine, illness and welfare occupies a central place in all our lives. The MA is designed to enable students who want to understand the place of medicine and welfare in society and history (c1750-1980) and to engage with some critical debates. Students will have the opportunity to explore themes through various media including film, literature, and art, amongst others.
-How did culture and society respond to disease, health campaigns, new medical theories and innovations? Is there a relationship between medicine, welfare, ethnicity and identity?
-How is medical and lay knowledge of sickness and therapeutics formed?
-Can an understanding of these questions help in the development of current public health policy?
-The MA provides a comprehensive understanding of historical methodologies and their potential application to current debates about disease and welfare.
-The practical skills – project-management, writing with clarity and precision, and communication skills – garnered are essential for a range of careers including teaching, all forms of media, politics and academia.