The readings for our class tomorrow are concerned with the ways in which the global migration of bodies for the purpose of procuring medical treatment or bodily alteration, also known as "Medical Tourism", has effected not only the individual bodies that move, but also have effects on international economic and political systems as well as the social and moral constructions of personhood. Medical Tourism is not as flippant as it sounds, instead involving an intensive negotiation of values, resources, and reconfiguring a global framework of power.
The first reading by Elizabeth Roberts and Nancy Scheper-Hughes is an introduction to a book comprised of a collection of articles having to do with medical migrations and the ways in which "biological knowledge, norms and practices are contested, reconfigured, transformed, iterated, and how these medical migrations transform the biological. They focus on three main themes: mobilities, places and biologies. In mobilities, the contributing authors write explore the effect of travel and mobility on state borders and how bodies are effected by these borders. The "ability to move" is of central importance in understanding the way that the body transforms in relation to global borders. In the section on places, the pieces hone in on the political and economic repercussions of medical migration, largely influenced by neoliberal ideologies. Medical migration involves a flow of bodies, which are commodified and seen as sources of capital, effecting the economic prospects of a state and by association, its political dilemmas and decisions, or as Roberts and Scheper-Hughes put more succinctly: "the divergent political and economic histories of specific places do shape and infant can compile the movements of medical migrants." The last section, biologies, discusses the way that physical human bodies are understood and defined differently in this new context of mobility and border crossing. The body is understood in new ways depending on the context in which it is placed in and the conditions under which it is subjected. The next reading, by Professor Song, is concerned with "biotech pilgrims" and the true significance of these migratory journeys. Song argues that the word "tourism" negates the "significant expense and hardship" of these travel patterns and takes for granted the deep personal and spiritual effects that these experiences have on the individual and on communities. There is a sense of hope and faith that is intrinsic in this process, along with ideals of self-sacrifice and altruism, exploration and courage. These trips are made because the individuals are willing to go around the world to find a cure, to find salvation. These travelers undergo a transformative process, in a quest for biotechnologies, which affect not only their own sense of personhood, but also visions of the state and global economy. The next reading is written by Scheper-Hughes and concerns the trafficking of human organs, through the lens of commodification of organs and of the criminality of the 'enterprise'. Around this illegal industry of organ trafficking, knowledge about the world is completely reconstructed, in all places around the world, from the understanding of the self and society, reality, death, bodies, persons, fact, etc. The practice and the criminal nature tied to it alters the way in which we think about the world, all over the world.
These articles are fascinating in the ways that the authors are able to explain the way that a seemingly individualistic endeavor has global consequences, reshaping the way we understand ourselves, our state and our economics in relation to the rest of the world. I would love to talk more about these transformative processes in class, specifically looking further into the ways that state shape their economic policies and other political programs around the expectation of medical tourism. Through this, I hope that we can continue our discussion of the way in which the state can influence biology. I think a key piece of this conversation is the fact that these people are migrants, and some of the less economically privileged travelers are unable to return to their country of origin or had left for a reason; therefore, can we talk about the way that the home country receives these people (more conversation from Ticktin and humanitarianism)? I am really struck by the way that different scales, from our bodies to global economics, are effected by individual choice, which is in turn influenced by global conditions.
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