Which research question motivates you at the moment?
Intergenerational transmission of health disparities (syndemics): pathways to transmission and pathways to resilience.

For me, ‘impact’ means...
Building on insights of both patients and providers: Contributing to solutions for specific problems in clinical practice, contributing to new or restructured policy and translating evidence into curriculum for health professionals.

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology?
Impossible to pick one : ) Death without weeping (Nancy Scheper-Hughes), The illness narratives (Arthur Kleinman) and Sen's work on the capability approach inspired me to become a medical anthropologist.

Which research question motivates you at the moment?
It is not so much a research question as a theme that has been present in different ways in my work, the invisibility of care work performed by informal caregivers, and community-based voluntary care workers. In my work on aging in the context of HIV/AIDS in Eastern Africa the physical burden of care, both in terms of the actual labor of care but also the bodily consequences of loss was a central theme in storytelling by older people. Also self-care, a theme I have been interested in for years often isn't tangible, it takes place in minds and practices, and is hard work that often remains invisible. At the moment I am starting a project tracing practices of evidence making and care-work in reports written by of lay counselors in a parenting intervention in South Africa aimed at the future health of a generation. I am interested in how lay counselors write about their activities and their presence, how responsibility for future health of infants is discussed and how the reports can be evidence of relational care work that is part of the project's strategy of 'being there' for mothers. This project is also interesting methodologically since we are turning existing reports into ethnographic data, have to come up with methods and strategies to analyse large volumes of qualitative data and because we need to solve the methodological puzzle of analysing non-active presence (being there), through written narratives in which we cannot observe what has not been reported on. Part of this analysis work will be done through virtual collaboration workshops.

For me, ‘impact’ means...
For me impact means many things but one is providing a different perspective. In teaching I aim to change students' perspectives on global health, their own positionally, what counts as evidence. In my research I hope to bring the other stories that often go untold, or unravel taken for granted concepts. In collaborations with societal partners, impact is when both parties take the time to sit and reflect on what exchanges have brought. But in all cases, slowing down and carefulness is core to how I want to work in a meaningful way.

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology? 
I have many favorite books so this was a difficult question. After long deliberation I decided to go back to the that changed my thinking as a young student which was 'Death Without Weeping: The Violence of Everyday Life in Brazil by Nancy Scheper-Hughes'. University of California Press. 1993. I still love the first chapter on methods and interestingly the topic of everyday violence, motherhood and emotions is core to my current project. A bit of a full circle moment. I secretly throw in another book which I bought recently which is 'Experimenting with Ethnography: A Companion to Analysis (2021) edited by Ballastero and Ross Winthereik, because it focuses on analysis as 'concrete mode of action and creative practice'. I really like this collection of essays because of its focus on analysis - my entire new project is about experimenting with analysis, and because of its focus on creative practice. Especially in teaching Global Public Health students; it is so important, to be able to shift perspective, experiment, and be open to many modes of knowing.

Which research question motivates you at the moment?
The research questions that motivate me at the moment are all connected to cultural diversity; global health, gender and complementary and alternative medicine. My affiliation is more based on teaching than on carrying out own research. But I do supervise several research (BA, MA and PhD), themes are Lesbians in Cuba (MA); Elderly social groups in Cuba (MA); Professional Identity Formation in medical education (PhD) and Safety 2 in a hospital (PhD). Topics of BA research all in Cuba: Single motherhood, Diabetes and Diet; Male violence on Female; Women and smoking of tobacco; Mental health among students.

For me, ‘impact’ means...
At this moment impact for me means making medical students aware of cultural diversity and the importance of the knowledge of global health. Medical students need to be aware of their own bias, develop an open view on the world/other cultures and be aware of how themes of global health may affect local health problems.

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology?
I don't have one favorite book in medical anthropology at the moment.

Which research question motivates you at the moment?
My research is motivated by a desire to understand how the social sciences have shaped processes of state formation, decolonization, and development in the twentieth century. Through examining this connection, I contribute to our understanding of how local actors and mediators shaped global histories of development and decolonization, including its intellectual histories, as mediators in an array of knowledge production and development projects.

For me, ‘impact’ means...
changing how we see the past to give us a sense of the broad possibilities for change today. Historians often wrestle with integrating structure and contingency into a single analysis, but when we do so, we offer narratives which account for both human agency and structures of economic and political power. This combination has an impact because it allows people to see the world both pragmatically and with a good deal of hope. 

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology?
My favorite book in medical anthropology is "El Proceso de Aculturación y el cambio socio-cultural en México" (1957) by Gonzalo Aguirre Beltrán. Aguirre was one of the first modern medical anthropologists in Mexico, and his work shaped government programs in rural Mexico, especially for Indigenous peoples. It was based on both contemporaneous ethnography and archival research into records of the Holy Office of the Inquisition. Aguirre reconciles changing medical practices with political and economic structures, showing how the concepts of "tradition" and "modern" medicine are produce by both agency and structure. The analysis is eclectic and ambitious, but its "applied" focus also entails an interest in intervening in the process of acculturation to nudge it in a particular direction. While I am troubled by the implications of this move, the book ultimately reflects the brilliance and passion of its author, and its wide-ranging influences and impact make it an exceptional window into the relationship between social sciences and public health politics in the middle of the twentieth century. 

Which research question motivates you at the moment?
How do cultural and religious notions of embodied and personhood shape care relations in patients, healthcare workers and caregivers?

For me, ‘impact’ means...
to be able to make my research work accessible to people outside of academia.

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology
My favourite book in medical anthropology is Lisa (graphic medicine).  

Which research question motivates you at the moment?
I am currently interested in the ways in which people practice end-of-life care in different places in the world, how this diversity finds a place in varying models of professional palliative care, and how access to such care is distributed.

For me, ‘impact’ means...
all the effects of research, including not only how results are picked up in science and society, but also teaching, and the social effects of preparing and conducting research.

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology?
If I have to choose, I will say 'The Paradox of Hope: Journeys through a Clinical Borderland' by Cheryl Mattingly, a moving and fascinating ethnographic monograph on the ways in which African American families with seriously ill children in California navigate care in a "border zone" of race, class and health care structures. I am thoroughly inspired by Mattingly's narrative phenomenology approach, and I also love her second book on this research project 'Moral Laboratories: Family Peril and the Struggle for a Good life.' A more recent book I highly recommend is Saiba Varma's beautiful and incisive 'The Occupied Clinic: Militarism and Care in Kashmir.'

Which research question motivates you at the moment?
How can we create an inclusive society for all older adults?

For me, ‘impact’ means...
that what our findings tell us can foster scientific insights, through which we can develop policy advice, practical tools or education that most importantly contributes to the lives of, in my case, older adults. Ultimately, impact means that it makes a difference for the individual whom we involved in our study.

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology?Difficult question! How to answer that one? Many, many come to mind. I enjoy reading close ethnography that detail the intrincacies yet show us the urgency of medical anthropology, such as for instance in the late Sharon Kaufman's 'Ordinary Medicine: Extraordinary Treatments, Longer Lives and Where to Draw the Line.' But being a social anthropologist interested in identity and language, I can't help but also think of something that draws these interests together such as in 'Language, society and the elderly' of Nikolas and Justine Coupland. 

Which research question motivates you at the moment?
How have people in different contexts reordered care by using (their) communities: varying from disabled people who have started “independent living” initiatives to the World Health Organization which has used indigenous technologies for their Community-Based Rehabilitation Manual. 

For me, ‘impact’ means...
doing research that is relevant for other people within and outside academia, but I do not like the word because it suggests measurability and one-way traffic whereas I would like to see my work in constant interaction with others.

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology
The Body Multiple, written by Annemarie Mol: I cannot think of another book in the field that is so mind-blowing, so lucid, so original and that combines think- and fieldwork so nicely - but maybe that is due to the fact that I am a historian who has not read enough medical anthropology yet.

Which research question motivates you at the moment?
In my research, I have mainly focused on end-of-life and palliative care. The key interest that binds my work together is how people experience and navigate aging, loss, and death. I am interested in how people anticipate the end of life and a future with illness, and how they confront the changes these bring about in everyday life.

For me, ‘impact’ means...
For me, ‘impact’ is when the stories that I share through my research enable another person to develop new insights into a situation they are facing. A part of this, is to work towards policies and practices that connect with people’s experiences. Equally important is the impact of contributing to (medical) anthropological debates with new theory and ways of thinking.

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology
‘…And a time to die’ by Sharon Kaufman has been very influential in my research. It is an encompassing book that describes the process of dying and managing death in American hospitals. Due to its richness, I keep endlessly returning to this book.

Another favorite is ‘The Pastoral Clinic’ by Angela Garcia. For me, it exemplifies what ethnography is about: Beautiful writing that is able to capture the liveliness of people’s worlds, while also making important conceptual contributions – a wonderful balance of theory and storytelling.

Which research question motivates you at the moment?
I am currently researching reproductive cancer and end-of-life care. My main research question is how women with reproductive cancer navigate access to care. I am looking at how gender relations and class affect the care of women? who cares for women with reproductive cancer, and how do they do so? And how do women and their caregivers engage in the decision-making on end-of-life care?

For me, ‘impact’ means...
contributions of our research to change, not only within the scientific community or academia but also beyond, including our research participants, policymakers, and wider society. Impact, to any extent, is not only limited to research findings or results but throughout the research process. Impact can also be intended or unintended, or expected and unexpected.

What is your favorite book in medical anthropology?
My favourite ethnographic book is The Spirit of Ambulance by Scott Stonington, which for me provides an insightful ethnography of death and dying. I also like the book Medicine in The Meantime by Ramah McKay, which portrays the intersection between neoliberalism and health care. I learned much from this book about transnational health and humanitarianism.