Race, Ethnicity, and Racism in Medical Anthropology, 1977–2002

Researchers across the health sciences are engaged in a vigorous debate over the role that the concepts of "race" and "ethnicity" play in health research and clinical practice. Here we contribute to that debate by examining how the concepts of race, ethnicity, and racism are used in medical–anthropological research. We present a content analysis of Medical Anthropology and Medical Anthropology Quarterly , based on a systematic random sample of empirical research articles ( n = 283) published in these journals from 1977 to 2002. We identify both differences and similarities in the use of race, ethnicity, and racism concepts in medical anthropology and neighboring disciplines, and we offer recommendations for ways that medical anthropologists can contribute to the broader debate over racial and ethnic inequalities in health.     

Ethnicity,race and class in the United States

Orlando Patterson, Ethnic Chauvinism: The Reactionary Impulse, New York: Stein and Day, 1977, 347 pp., $15.00.

William Julius Wilson, The Declining Significance of Race: Blacks and Changing American Institutions, Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1978, xxi + 204 pp. £8.85.     

Trends in Educational Attainment by Race/Ethnicity, Nativity, and Sex in the United States, 1989-2005

Despite the importance of education for shaping individuals' life chances, little research has examined trends and differences in educational attainment for detailed demographic subpopulations in the United States. We use labor market segmentation and cohort replacement theories, linear regression methods, and data from the National Health Interview Survey to understand educational attainment by race/ethnicity, nativity, birth cohort, and sex between 1989 and 2005 in the United States. There have been significant changes in educational attainment over time. In support of the cohort replacement theory, we find that across cohorts, females have enjoyed greater gains in education than men, and for some race/ethnic groups, recent cohorts of women average more years of education than comparable men. And in support of labor market segmentation theories, foreign-born Mexican Americans continue to possess relatively low levels of educational attainment. Our results can aid policymakers in identifying vulnerable populations, and form the base from which to better understand changing disparities in education.     

Malaria in the United Kingdom

Over the past decade the United Kingdom had the second highest number of cases of imported malaria among European countries. There has been a substantial rise in recorded cases of malaria during the past three years though some of it may be due to improved notification. Fatal cases of malaria in visitors to Africa have averaged 6.5% of reported infections due to Plasmodium falciparum. Attacks of vivax malaria may occur several months after travellers return from a malarious country.     

Gender,Ethnicity, Marital Status,and Body Weight in the United States

Married individuals tend to be heavier than those who are unmarried, particularly men, and individuals in different ethnic categories vary in their involvement in marriage and in their body weights. We examined gender and ethnic differences in relationships between marital status and body weight using cross‐sectional data from the 1999–2002 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) for 3,947 women and 4,019 men. The findings revealed that compared to married men in the same ethnic category, white divorced men, black never‐married men, and all Hispanic men except for widows had lower odds of being overweight. Compared to married women in the same ethnic category, white women's weights did not significantly differ by marital status, black separated women had greater odds of being overweight, and Hispanic never‐married women had lower odds of being overweight. Associations of marriage with body weight appear to be at least partly contingent upon gender and ethnicity, which may reflect larger societal patterns of involvement in marriage, commitment to family, and body‐weight norms and expectations.     

Imported Malaria in the United Kingdom

Over 2,000 cases of imported malaria have been confirmed by blood examination. Ninety percent. of cases from tropical Africa were infected with P. falciparum. Most of the patients were Caucasians and had primary infections. All developed fever within a month after arrival and most of them within two weeks of arrival. In some patients malaria parasites were seen in routine blood films.Developing forms of P. falciparum were always present in the peripheral blood of patients suffering from a primary attack which was not diagnosed or treated until a week or more after the onset of fever.All deaths investigated were caused by P. falciparum and were primary infections.In not one of the P. falciparum infections did the victim continue taking prophylactic drugs for more than a few days after leaving the endemic area. Had drugs been continued for one month probably not a single overt case of P. falciparum would have occurred.A primary attack of P. falciparum malaria is seldom, if ever, classical in that the fever is never tertian and may resemble clinically many other diseases.Children in boarding-schools returning from the tropics should be supplied with prophylactic tablets and instructions to the matron. If there is an epidemic of a fever any students who have recently returned from the tropics should have a blood film examined for malaria.The risk of contracting malaria among drug addicts is considerable, especially with P. falciparum.     

Geochemistry and health in the United Kingdom.

Before the 1960s, comparisons between the distribution of trace elements in the environment and health in the United Kingdom were primarily confined to ad hoc studies in areas associated with particular agricultural disorders or with unusual human mortality or morbidity records. More recently, increasing interest in the importance of trace elements in crop and animal production and in the hazards of environmental pollution have created a need for more systematic geochemical data. Geochemical reconnaissance maps for England, Wales, Northern Ireland and parts of Scotland have demonstrated the extent of many known clinical trace element problems in agriculture and have also been valuable in delineating areas within which subclinical disorders may occur. Their application to studies on the composition of soils, food crops and surface waters in relation to public health has proved encouraging. Current knowledge and present investigations into environmental geochemistry and human health in the U.K. are reviewed, together with future research requirements.     

The Festive State: Race, Ethnicity and Nationalism as Cultural Performance

The Festive State: Race, Ethnicity and Nationalism as Cultural Performance. David M. Guss. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000. 252 pp.