Medical Humanities Podcast

We are excited to present Riva Lehrer, artist and author, and her book GOLEM GIRL, about disability, embodiment, joy, and becoming herself. Read the blog with the transcription of this podcast here: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2023/03/04/podcast-with-riva-lehrer-author-of-golem-girl-a-memoir. Subscribe to the Medical Humanities Podcast in all podcast platforms, including Apple Podcast...

J. Rick Castañeda is a writer, director and producer (https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1479268/?ref_=tt_ov_dr). His works have been around the world to festivals in London, Canada, Japan, and Romania, as well as festivals in the US such as SXSW. He made over 30 short films, earning recognition from YouTube, Crackle, and Funny or Die. Rick uses humour to explore stress, anxiety and disenfranchisement in...

Brandy interviews Donna McCormack about the December Special Issue, Transplant and its Imaginaries. Donna McCormack, Chancellor'S Fellow and Senior Lecturer (with co-editor Magrit Shildrick) proposes new understandings of the limits and possible extensions of organ and tissue transplantation. The Special Issue of Medical Humanities is available here: https://mh.bmj.com/content/47/4 Read the relate...

Join us on this episode of the Medical Humanities Podcast as Brandy Schillace speaks with Eric Garcia, author of WE’RE NOT BROKEN: Changing the Autism Conversation (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, August 3, 2021). Eric Garcia is a journalist based in Washington, D.C. Read the related blog post (with the transcription of the whole podcast) here: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/11/05/eric-g...

In this podcast, Kristina Lindström and Kristian Petri (Swedish film makers) reflect on their documentary film 'The most beautiful boy in the world' (2021) and their professional relationship with the film's protagonist, Björn Andrésen. Björn came to international fame at the age of 15 when Italian director Luchino Visconti cast him as Tadzio, the young boy in his film 'Death in Venice' (1971). Kr...

This podcast features Clare Barker, Associate Professor in English Literature, University of Leeds, and guest editor of our Medical Humanities June Special Issue for 2021: Global Genetic Fictions. Read more on the Medical Humanities website: https://mh.bmj.com/content/47/2 Read the transcript of this podcast in the Medical Humanities blog (https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/09/02/clare-...

An outlook at how disabled lives have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and, in particular, by the current vaccine roll-out. Alice Wong, a disabled activist, and Alyssa Burgart, an anesthesiologist and ethicist at Stanford University, tell Medical Humanities' Editor-in-Chief, Brandy Schillace, how disabled lives have been overlooked in this crisis, as the very systems and designs of medicine...

Medical Humanities' Editor-in-Chief, Brandy Schillace, talks to Dr. Eleanor Janega, a medieval historian, about comparisons between COVID-19 and the Black Death. Read the blog post, which includes the transcript of the podcast, here: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/07/15/going-medieval-historical-comparisons-of-plague-and-pandemic/

Editor-in-Chief of Medical Humanities, Brandy Schillace, speaks to Brian Sims, an openly gay LGBTQ activist, Pennsylvania State Representative, and civil rights attorney about the power of representation, and what minority groups offer to better governance. Read the related blog with this podcast's transcript: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/06/10/celebrating-pride-month-with-brian-s...

Sarah Gavron talks to our film and media correspondent, Khalid Ali, about her passion for telling stories about marginalised women from diverse backgrounds in her films. Read the blog post, which includes the transcript of the podcast, here: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/05/27/the-female-gaze-in-film-as-seen-by-sarah-gavron

David Perry is a freelance journalist covering politics, history, education, and disability rights with bylines at CNN, NYT, Atlantic, Guardian and many more. He and his food-scientist wife live in the Twin Cities with their children, one of whom has Down syndrome, and Perry also plays in an Irish rock band. Today on the podcast, David talks about access and education under COVID-19. What does it...

Editor-in-Chief of Medical Humanities, Brandy Schillace, speaks to Arabella Proffer, an artist whose work combines the history of medicine with biomorphic abstraction about life, art, and cancer. Read the related blog post, which includes the transcript of this podcast: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/04/21/life-art-cancer-living-to-the-fullest

In this podcast, Editor-in-Chief of Medical Humanities, Brandy Schillace, speaks to Natalie Kerres, designer of SCALED and a recent graduate of Imperial College London and the Royal College of Art. SCALED is wearable technology designed for sports, medicine, and disability. Read the transcript of this podcast in the Medical Humanities blog: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/04/07/desig...

Rita Colwell is one of the top scientists in America: the groundbreaking microbiologist who discovered how cholera survives between epidemics and the former head of the National Science Foundation. She joins us for International Women’s Day, discussing the trials and successes of being a woman in science and her new book A Lab of One’s Own. Read the related blog post with the transcript of this po...

In this podcast, Brandy Schillace, Medical Humanities Editor-in-Chief, interviews Dr. Oni Blackstock, physician and Director of Health Justice Dr. Blackstock speaks about the influence of her mother, the fight against health inequality, and her own struggles as a Black woman physician for social justice. Read the related blog post: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/02/24/the-power-of-e...

Dr. Josh Mugele, a disaster and emergency medicine physician, speaks about health disparity during crises like the current COVID pandemic. Read the blog post containing the transcript of this podcast: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/02/04/what-becomes-of-us-health-disparity-in-pandemic/

Jaipreet Virdi’s latest book, Hearing Happiness raises pivotal questions about deafness in American society and the endless quest for a cure. Read the blog post: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2021/01/05/hearing-happiness-jaipreet-virdi-on-deafness-accessibility-and-her-latest-book/

Therese Feiler, a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, describes the interdisciplinary Medical Humanities special issue, bringing together cardiac surgeons, cultural historians and theologians on matters of the heart (https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2020/12/10/podcast-heart-in-medicine-history-and-culture). Please read: - the editorial: https://mh.bmj.com/content...

What would it mean if, instead of being “add-ons,” accessibility tools like captions and transcripts were built into a project from the ground up? What if instead of thinking about accessibility as “mere” additions only, we realized their incredible creative power? Read the related blog post: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2020/11/19/accessibility-creation-community-an-interview-with-che...

In today’s podcast, Dr. Henry Ng, MD MPH, Cleveland Clinic, speaks with Editor-in-Chief of Medical Humanities, Brandy Schillace, about issues of LGBTQ+ and health accessibility. Already a difficult prospect, access to care for this population has become increasingly precarious during the COVID epidemic. Read the blog post: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2020/10/27/accessing-the-future-wa...

Sarah Hendren’s book, What Can A Body Do? How We Meet the Built World, looks at design and disability at all scales: prosthetics, furniture, architecture, urban planning, and more, to examine critically the definition of the good life. Read the related blog post: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2020/09/25/the-dignity-of-help-sara-hendrens-what-a-body-can-do/

How do we make something really and truly accessible? Chris Higgins talks about what led to his 2019 short film Access, and the fact that accessibility isn’t about making a different product for those with disabilities; it’s about making the product with all people in mind. To find out more about the film: https://accessmovie.org/

Dr. Oni Blackstock joins us to speak about social justice, Black Lives Matter, LGBTQ rights and the way the COVID-19 crisis has unequally affected marginalized communities. Dr. Blackstock is Assistant Commissioner for the NYC Health Department's Bureau of HIV. Link to the blog post: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2020/07/03/where-race-disparity-and-pandemic-collide-covid-19-usa

In this podcast, we discuss the June Special issue, "Beyond the Battlefield" and the impact of medical crisis and treatment on non-combatant bodies - still so relevant in today’s COVID-19 crises. Medical Humanities Editor, Brandy Schillace, speaks to Dr Hannah Simpson, a postdoctoral scholar at St Anne's College, University of Oxford, specialising in modern and contemporary theatre and performance...

Medical Humanities Editor Brandy Schillace speaks to Alice Wong, a disabled activist, media maker, and consultant based in San Francisco. She is the Founder and Director of the Disability Visibility Project® and speaks about increasing disability access in the face of coronavirus pandemic. Read the blog post and the transcript of this podcast: https://blogs.bmj.com/medical-humanities/2020/04/30/di...