Paper short abstract:

Breast cancer prevention discourses are riddled with references to individual responsibilities for health. Yamatji women are not only exposed to the moralizing discourses of biomedicine, but also culturally specific ones that blame a woman for a positive breast cancer diagnosis.

Paper long abstract:

For decades breast cancer had been stigmatized, but over the last two decades education and changing attitudes have considerably reduced this stigma, or so it is believed. Looking closely at breast cancer prevention discourses, it is strikingly apparent that lifestyle choices, and with it a person's individual responsibility for their health, are heavily emphasized within biomedicine. Yamatji women are subjected to this moralizing biomedical discourse of personal responsibility, and a more culturally specific one: among Australian Aboriginal groups, it is widely believed that a positive breast cancer diagnosis is the result of having broken a taboo. This paper discusses these discourses, and shows how the moral determinism of a positive diagnosis is therefore not only embedded within biomedicince, but also within specific Australian Aboriginal health beliefs that in this instance holds the individual responsible for their own health. Transgressing against these rules - breaking a taboo - subsequently exposes the individual to shaming by family and community members and social isolation as a consequence. Trying to avoid the moral judgement from community members by shunning certain services such as mammograms, Yamatji women draw moral judgement from medical professionals and others as being irresponsible and ignorant highlighting once again the moral determinism of biomedicine in breast cancer discourses.

Paper short abstract:

In this paper I examine ethical assumptions that connect empathy, intimacy and the good life, and ontological ones that connect intersubjectivity, imagination and socialisation. I examine both from the perspective of the experience and capabilities of people diagnosed on the autism spectrum.

Paper long abstract:

Empathy runs like a thread through the history of anthropology. Methodologically it has figured as a key aspect of participant observation, our royal road to the life-worlds of others. Ontologically it lies at the foundation of intersubjectivity and the social capacities of humans. In its contemporary turn it ties in with developmental concepts such as theory of mind and joint attention as a core conception of what it is to be human that attempts to bridge a phenomenology of the social world and cognitive psychology. And yet it remains a term that is used as if everybody already knew what it meant. In this paper I examine the implications of locating empathy at the heart of our conception of the human from the perspective of the experience, capabilities and developmental trajectories of people diagnosed as being on the autism spectrum. I draw on the preliminary results of a project on the life histories of adults diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome (now incorporated into the Autism Spectrum in the DSM-5), a range of autobiographies of people on the spectrum and the major themes of contemporary neurodiversity activism. In particular I consider what it would mean if we were to displace (1) intimacy from the centre of our conception of the good life and (2) intersubjective synchronisation with others as our basis for knowledge of the world.

Paper short abstract:

This paper discusses the landscape of Swedish HIV prevention where risk assessment and moral discernment intersect. It starts off at the ban of gay saunas in 1987 (considered a moral law by many) and moves on to the blood-safety regulations of today, where moral ruling is deemed as non-existent.

Paper long abstract:

Gay saunas were banned in Sweden in 1987, as they were seen as severe contaminations where "AIDS was allowed to be spread". The latter phrasing was an actual headline in a Swedish newspaper from October 1986. That feature is largely accountable for launching the so-called 'media uprising' that depicted the saunas as nothing but infectious sites, where immoral sexual behaviour was encouraged. Consequently, the following year, the Swedish parliament instituted a ban of "certain operations" - which directly targeted these saunas. The process was prompt, as the traditional referral procedure had been dropped.

The Swedish gay community strongly objected to this ban, calling it nothing but a moral law implemented to stop gay men from living 'sinful lives'; a civic moral outrage seeking to prohibit certain people from having sex (in certain ways) - rather than to prevent HIV from spreading. The said ban was not revoked until year 2004, after a three-year-long investigation had concluded that it no longer fulfilled its purpose.

Nowadays, moral laws are seen as something of the past. Authorities frequently state how their conducts are based on objective and fair science, unaffected by moral judgements. Yet, gay men are still marginalized in the passing by still being (indirectly) banned from donating blood, as same-sex practices still remain a severe high-risk behaviour. This paper sets out to discuss the narratives of a moralist stance in Swedish HIV prevention; ascertaining how actors have gone from condemning moral laws to instituting 'objective' and indisputable processes - without introducing any major alterations.

Paper short abstract:

This paper investigates the ways in which diverse health seeking behaviours (underpinned by ongoing shifts in local moral worlds and seemingly contradictory forms of sociality, relationality, and subjectivity) might be woven together and communicated to improve access to mental health services.

Paper long abstract:

Transcultural psychiatric studies have long shown that culture matters for how an illness is experienced and for the explanatory model influencing diagnosis. In post conflict Timor Leste, customary health and healing practices are deeply embedded in the inter-relationships between people, the ancestors and the environment. The vast majority of mental illnesses in Timor Leste are attributed by sufferers to place specific supernatural causes and in rural areas people will in most cases prioritize treatment by traditional healers in 'place' (usually locations close to their ancestral spirit houses) over treatment in places which are both socially and spiritually unknown. In more urban contexts, approaches to health and healing have been shaped by the influence of Christianity and in particular charismatic (and universalising) faith-healing practices common to both the Catholic and Protestant traditions. Although there is a high-level of informal awareness amongst the Timorese themselves of these complementary practices, this paper investigates the ways in which these diverse health seeking behaviours (underpinned by ongoing shifts in local moral worlds and seemingly contradictory forms of sociality, relationality, and subjectivity) might be woven together and communicated in order to improve equitable access to culturally and context-appropriate mental health services.

Paper short abstract:

This paper discusses research findings about ongoing reliance on folk herbal medicine among poor consumers. Challenges to the intellectual property of western herbal medicine and its heritage provide a moral framing of biomedical norms.

Paper long abstract:

This paper discusses anthropological research findings about complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) in Australia, in light of questions around the intellectual property of Western Herbal Medicine and the difficult issue of 'cultural genocide'. Herbal medicine or folk medicine, is a leading branch of CAM, with a long, colourful history. The knowledge base of herbal medicine was partially attenuated during 13th-17th centuries, due to the impact of the black plague in Europe and the fearful 'witch-burning' frenzy of the subsequent Reformation era. Recent challenges to the time-honoured status of herbal medicine have occurred due to new ideologies and dominant political alliances established concurrently with the development of biomedicine, and through the uptake of complementary medicines by 'integrative medicine' doctors.

The historical position and evolving standing of herbal medicine in relation to biomedicine, invites critique of this process of social change as an aspect of a sweeping cultural imperialism or 'deep colonisation', verging on cultural genocide. The marginalisation of herbal medicine is bolstered by a moral framing of policy directives, within an enclosing capitalist social structure.

Against this dramatic background, ethnographic research in a rural Victorian community revealed frequent consumption of self-provided complementary and alternative medicines among poorer consumers. Interviewees chose self-prescribed folk herbal medicine as an effective, economic means to manage their own health when unable to afford private-sector practitioner consultations. There was evidence of the persistence of grass-roots use of traditional herbal medicine, and of the holistic, nature-focused and often staunchly resistant philosophical outlook that informs it.

Paper short abstract:

In this paper I examine how the acquisition of expertise backed by state support for certain forms of practice and education has created moral tensions within the Thai traditional medicine community. I highlight the contradictions and moral tensions inherent in the emergence of expertise in modernity.

Paper long abstract:

There are moral dimensions to the acquisition and creation of professional expertise in a rapidly modernising country and this paper explores how notions of expertise are intimately connected to forms of education and to cultural understandings of knowledge, legitimacy and value. I draw on ethnographic material from research in Thailand that shows how health policies have re-shaped the practice of Thai traditional medicine through university-based education, the licensing of practitioners and the introduction of a scientific rationale for treatment. University education has transformed the status and aspirations of students studying Thai traditional medicine and created tensions within the traditional medicine community about the knowledge base and the status of licensed and unlicensed practitioners.

The regulation of practitioners and the establishment of a state-supported hierarchy of legitimacy and skill that excludes unlicensed traditional medicine practitioners, highlights the contradictions and moral tensions inherent in the emergence of expertise in modernity. I examine the moral dimensions of the selective authorisation of modern licensed practitioners and the de-legitimation of folk healers whose skills are obtained through apprenticeship, experience and adherence to Buddhist values. Local moral worlds continue to challenge and disrupt modernised approaches to knowledge acquisition established through university education and licensing. The contradictions and moral tensions inherent in professional recognition for one group exemplify the problems associated with medical expertise cultivated through university training that carries with it the status, values and meanings associated with the institutions of modern medicine and education.

Paper short abstract:

In this paper, I will explore the process of crafting one's moral self for young Chileans who have diabetes. I will present the tension this project represents for them, as they struggle to balance everyday life with the biomedical training on the "code of conduct" for good diabetics.

Paper long abstract:

This paper examines Foucault's reflections on the ethical project of "care of the self" (1985), in relation to the everyday experiences of young people with type 1 diabetes. I conducted 12 months of fieldwork in Chile, finding that they not only explore multiple possibilities during the transition towards adulthood, but also engage in a process of crafting themselves as moral beings (Mattingly 2014).

For them, the "art of existence" (Foucault 1985, 10) not only involves training one's self to become a good employee, parent or student, but also a desire to vivir bien - or live well.

The attainment of this desire is somewhat conditioned by diabetes and the threat of developing short- and long-term health complications. To avoid these, and to "live well", they ought to follow the "good diabetics" code of conduct, forged by clinicians over many years of treatment. This code represents a 24/7 commitment, and it involves performing self-care routines, making good decisions, planning for the future, evaluating past decisions - both practically and morally - and re-accommodating them when necessary.

I will argue that the cultivation of moral selves represents a permanent struggle for young individuals. They constantly strive to balance the moral responsibility of behaving like "good diabetics", and thus taking care of themselves, with the everyday opportunity to perform a diabetes-free life. In this struggle, they become accountable - to themselves and the biomedical system - of their past decisions, but also responsible for "living well" in the future.

Paper short abstract:

Employing corporeal feminism and Deleuzo-Guattarian ideas, this paper explores women’s enactment of body practices at the intersection of breastfeeding, chronic milk insufficiency, and milk sharing. In so doing, it challenges dominant conceptualisations of the ‘failing’ maternal milk-producing body.

Paper long abstract:

The breastfeeding body as a site of complex, contested, and conspicuously moralised practices has long been a focus for professional and technical languages, often within a masculinised biomedical frame that marks the milk-producing body as problematic, failing, and necessarily subject to and object of expert knowledges.

In this paper I challenge such discourse through discussion of findings from ethnographic research with women who identify as experiencing 'chronic milk insufficiency', and who have shared in other women's breast milk to mediate and (re)construct the experience of breastfeeding concurrent with that bodily insufficiency. It draws on fieldwork with individual mothers in Australia and the US, as well as donor/recipient dyads and small mother-centred groups.

Through a conceptual frame comprised of corporeal feminism (Grosz 1994, Bartlett 2002, 2005); and ideas such as flows, becomings and deterritorialisation offered by Deleuze and Guattari (1987), I explore body practices enacted at this intersection of breastfeeding, bodily insufficiency, and milk sharing. Bodies and body practices are seen as constituted and reconfigured by an explicit inter-corporeality which encompasses such preindustrial tropes as wet nursing ranged alongside the extension and (dis)embodiment of motherhood, in part through technological bodies such as breast pumps and feeding aids. The non-normative moralities that inform and emerge from this intercorporeality thus respond to, challenge and subvert dominant biomedical conceptualisations of the (physiologically and morally) 'failing' female body, and of infant feeding conventions; and support the notion of continued breastfeeding concurrent with ongoing insufficient milk as an intersubjective, radicalised and radicalising act.

Paper short abstract:

This study of the internet celebrity and known steroid user Zyzz and his international following suggests a local moral world where performance and image enhancing drug (PIED) use is normal and not considered a moral issue. The presentation focusses on how gender-making practices inform PIED use.

Paper long abstract:

The Australian Crime Commission report that the detection of performance and image enhancing drugs (PIEDs) by the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service has seen a five-fold increase since 2009. Anecdotal evidence suggests that some Australian needle exchange services are now servicing more PIED users than users of any other drug. The increasing "steroid problem" has been largely approached from a performance perspective, but now that young men aiming for image enhancement make up the vast majority of steroid users this performance framework is less appropriate. PIED use has also been approached from an illicit drug framework which may not be appropriate given that my multi-sited online ethnographic research suggests that PIED users do not see themselves as drug users, but instead consider PIED use part of a healthy lifestyle. The evidence I have collected suggests that PIED users operate in a local moral world where PIED use has been normalised, and in fact may not consider PIED use as a moral issue. This presentation explores how the gender-making practices of bodybuilders who are fans of Zyzz (Aziz Shavershian, a known PIED user) inform and reflect on-the-ground shifts in morality.

Paper short abstract:

This paper explores the liminal space overweight individuals occupy when making decisions about, and acting upon, their bodies. It discusses the connection between ‘obesity’ and morality and examines the diverse experiences that exist within the overweight body.

Paper long abstract:

The framing of excessive body weight as problematic is one of the most dominant health discourses of the 21st century. In the midst of an 'obesity epidemic', biomedical narratives dominate public understandings of obesity and present fat individuals as a picture of poor-health, as lazy and morally irresponsible. This discourse dominates current discussions of obesity to the extent that narratives engaging with lived experiences of the fat body are frequently excluded from public discussion and popular thought. Anti-obesity researchers often present fatness as deviant behaviour, implying that people have a moral and medical obligation to manage their weight. In contrast to this, members of fat acceptance groups are beginning to embrace a body diversity frame and present fatness as a natural and largely inevitable form of diversity. Such views of the overweight body have the potential to alter fat individuals' understandings of their own bodies and their position in society as they work towards forming positive narratives of their own bodies - either in accepting their weight, or undertaking practices of weight loss. This paper explores the ethnographic connection between these perspectives of the overweight body by examining the liminal state between 'badness' and 'goodness' that many overweight individuals occupy when making decisions about, and upon, their bodies. This analysis connects obesity and morality by observing how fat individuals navigate the terrain of responsibility and morality, illustrating the diverse perspectives and experiences that exist within the overweight body and asks the question - at what point does 'fatness' become 'badness' and how do we define these moral states?