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This paper argues that children, as an important social group, repay study in connection with the sociology of health and illness. The paper outlines the neglect of children within medical sociology and goes on to open up a discussion towards a sociology of child health. The paper makes three main points. First, consideration of the case of health and illness helps understanding of children's social positioning as a minority group. Secondly, children present a clear case for considering people as embodied health care actors. Thirdly, taking account of children in the sociology of health requires rethinking the division of labour and inter-generational relationships within it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While sociologists earlier this century often used insights derived from psychoanalytic theory in their writings, contemporary sociology has largely tended to ignore this body of work. This is as true of medical sociologists as it is of others, despite the fact that the 'founding father' of medical sociology, Talcott Parsons, used psychoanalytic perspectives extensively in his theorising on the social aspects of medicine and health. In this paper I make a case for a return to a medical sociology that incorporates understandings of subjectivity derived from psychoanalytic writings, with particular reference to the medical encounter and the illness experience. The paper begins with an overview of psychoanalytic sociology. I go on to review the major insights Parsons developed in his writings and the work of other writers who have more recently used psychoanalytic theory productively in theorising the sociocultural dimensions of medicine and health care. The paper concludes with some thoughts about future directions for taking up the psychoanalytic perspective in the sociology of health and illness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents information on sociologist Everett Cherrington Hughes and his work. On January 5, 1983 Everett Hughes died in Cambridge, Massachusetts, aged 86. His death followed a long and distinguished career both as a writer and teacher, in which he had a profound influence on the development of sociology. His thought and work gave rise to particular forms of sociological inquiry and pervade a number of substantive domains within the discipline. Although not a medical sociologist, Hughes perhaps more than anyone else is responsible for placing medicine and health care on the sociological agenda and his approach continues to inform the study of health and illness. Despite his influence, Hughes's own work remains relatively unknown amongst social scientists and our familiarity with his thought and ideas derives largely through the many empirical studies of his students, colleagues and associates. Perhaps the most influential parts of Hughes's work, certainly within the sociology of health and illness, are his numerous essays concerning work and occupations.

This article presents an essay on medical sociology in Great Britain. Medical sociology is much more fun to do than to read or write about. Although there are socially approved places for both activities, they can be done anywhere and neither needs expensive equipment. If they must be enjoyed through the printed word rather than at first hand, personal memoirs seem generally preferred to how-to-do-it manuals, while accounts of changing forms and fashions or of cross-cultural variations attract only the most dedicated devotees. An alternative approach would have been to examine British medical sociology in comparison with European and North American developments. However Lisbeth Claus's recently published account of medical sociology in Europe has explored differences and similarities in much more detail than could be attempted here and several other authors have reviewed the field within the last decade. Medical sociologists are doubly alienated, for not only do they share this unease about the validity of experience, but they inhabit the interstices between the citadel of medicine and the suburb of sociology.

This article presents an essay on the subject and the social in medicine. The death of sociologist Michel Foucault in June 1984 was marked by extensive comment on his life and work in the French press but in Anglo-Saxon world, the event received simply a few short obituary notices. And while Foucault's newly published two volumes, which completed his "History of Sexuality," series, topped the non-fiction best-seller list in France, there was no such general interest in his work across the Channel. Nevertheless Foucault's work does seem to have had an influence on a series of academic disciplines such as philosophy, history, sociology and psychology. The lack of influence on medical sociology might seem particularly surprising in view of the fact that two of Foucault's books deal specifically with medical topics, namely madness and the clinic, and a third, on sexuality, has a strong medical dimension. In part his tack of impact has been attributed to the obscurity of his language and inaccessibility of his ideas.