CSPH 5602: Healing Stories: Narrative and Wellbeing
This course seeks to answer the question: “How can the stories that we tell ourselves and others contribute to our wellbeing?” To answer this question, students will consider how narrative can help us understand our emotions, create a sense of belonging, motivate us to address injustice, and re-author our stories.
This course seeks to answer the question: “How can the stories that we tell ourselves and others contribute to our wellbeing?” To answer this question, students will consider how narrative helps us understand our emotions, create a sense of belonging, motivate us to address injustice, and re-author our stories. Students will learn about the role of narrative in modern health practices, including narrative therapy and the clinical contributions of narrative medicine. Students will also survey perspectives on narrative and wellbeing less directly or explicitly related to healthcare in the US, including perspectives that de-center common Western European beliefs about narrative, describe the influence of colonialism on a person’s self-story, or provide counter-narratives as a form of healing.
Students will engage with a variety of content, including research and scholarship, therapeutic writing (e.g. diaries and personal health journals, such as CaringBridge), and popular literature (e.g. graphic novels and memoir). Students will not only read these stories, they will examine their wellbeing and apply what they learn by composing their own stories.
This course will invite practitioners, researchers, and campus organizers to speak with students broadly about the importance of narrative in their work.
Contact [email protected] for additional information.
- Spring