UCL hosts Healing Humanities conference

UCL will host the 5th Annual International Medical Humanities Conference on 14 and 15 September 2004.

'The Healing Humanities: Contextualising & Conceptualising Medicine' will help to cement UCL's position as the UK's leading institution in the field of medical humanities.

The conference has been organised by an interdisciplinary team made up of Dr Deborah Kirklin (Centre for Medical Humanities), Professor Hal Cook (Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine), Professor Michael Worton (Fielden Professor of French Language & Literature) and Professor John Aiken (Slade School of Fine Art). This emphasis on inter-disciplinariy forms the main theme of the conference, which examines the benefits of a cross-disciplinary approach to the study and teaching of medical humanities.

Leading academics from both Europe and the US, and from the arts and sciences, will take part in the event through a series of workshops and talks. There will also be a number of 'Special Interest Group' sessions which cater for those interested in areas as diverse as literature and medicine, creative writing in healthcare, and film and medicine.

The conference will also announce the winners of the first UCL Arts in Health Awards. The awards recognise and acknowledge the contribution of the arts to healthcare, by celebrating both the individual artists and those in the healthcare sector who commission them.

UCL's Centre for Medical Humanities was established in 1998 to coordinate the introduction of arts and humanities based initiatives into the undergraduate medical curriculum.