Health Promotion & Policy 690T - Public Health and the Arts

This course considers the use of creative works in advancing public health. Inspired by the concepts of arts-focused public health, arts-based research (ABR), and narrative medicine/medical humanities, we will encounter a range of creative arts being used in health contexts. We will examine scholarly research about how qualitative ABR can create and support effective public health efforts, and community-based experience with arts-focused approaches. We will study arts-based research (ABR) as it is used across the social sciences. We will practice using various artistic forms toward public health research and intervention, including digital storytelling (DST), graphic medicine, visual arts, literary arts, theater arts, and perhaps others as students' creative interests direct. A central question of this course: what are the social-ecological conditions that create poor health, and how might public health use and partner with the arts to promote population health and wellness?

Open to Graduate students only. Graduate students only.