Communicating Health and Illness

"It raises a number of thorny issues concerning what communication is, or might be, for embodied people… I enjoyed reading this book and it goes on my shelf in the knowledge that I shall reach for it again. It also becomes a key reference on my list of recommendations for students taking my 'health and illness' course… it deserves to be read as an excellent review of the field at present." - European Journal of Communication

In this book Richard Gwyn demonstrates the centrality of discourse analysis to an understanding of health and communication. Focusing on language and communication issues he demonstrates that it is possible to observe and analyze patterns in the ways in which health and illness are represented and articulated by both health professionals and lay people. Communicating Health and Illness: - Explores culturally validated notions of health and sickness and the medicalization of illness - Surveys media representations of health and illness - Considers the metaphoric nature of talk about illness - Contributes to the ongoing debate in relation to narrative based medicine