Meanings of Health: Interrogating Structure and Culture

Abstract

Based on the argument that context ought to be centralized in discourses of health communication, this article applies the culture-centered approach to engage in dialogue about issues of health with 18 men in rural West Bengal. The culture-centered approach is based on dialogue between the researcher and the community members, with the goals of listening to the voices of cultural members in suggesting culture-based health solutions. In this project, our discursive engagement with the participants suggests that health is primarily constructed as an absence, framed in the realm of minimal access to healthcare resources. In a situation where the resources are limited, the participants discussed the importance of trust in their relationship with the local provider. Health was also seen as a collective resource that was both an asset of the collective and a responsibility of the collective. Finally, the participants also pointed out the ways in which corruption in the structure introduced a paradox in policy discourse and the material conditions of the participants.

Engaging the Community in Health Research in India

“…Most of the community-engaged research studies reviewed involved adults (4,9,17,18,20,22), with a few studies including adolescents (10,12). Some studies focused on improving the health and wellbeing of children and adolescents specifically (7,8,10).…”

“…Although CBPR is advocated as a research strategy that is mutually beneficial to both researchers and community members and that improves community capacity and involvement (25), it is not fully clear whether the approach leads to better health outcomes. In a review of interventions designed using CBPR, studies that utilized a randomized controlled trial design indicated a positive effect on health (9). Those studies that utilized a quasiexperimental design had mixed findings (25).…”

From Patient Navigation to Cancer Justice: Toward a Culture-Centered, Community-Owned Intervention Addressing Disparities in Cancer Prevention

“…For instance, Dutta and Pal (2010) theorize the role of dialog with subaltern communities as providing "discursive openings for the interrogation of dominant sites of knowledge production" (p. 363). Similarly, Dutta and Basu (2008) provide a theoretical and methodological warrant for dialog with marginalized communities in highlighting how co-construction allows for local meanings of health to emerge, challenging elite knowledge and categories. This paper addresses the ways that received academic knowledge about patient navigation was reshaped based on dialogic co-construction of the local relevance and meaning of physicians, volunteers, potential navigators, and other community resources required to develop a navigation program.…”

“…Furthermore, this study extends the theorizing on dialog within the CCA (Dutta and Basu, 2008;Dutta and Pal, 2010), by focusing on how dialog with marginalized communities can be the entry point to developing bottom-up health solutions. This emphasis on dialogic co-construction differentiates our study from existent patient navigation interventions.…”

Community Engagement as a Process and an Outcome of Developing Culturally Grounded Health Communication Interventions: An Example from the DECIDE Project

“…Unlike many health campaigns, which often modify universal messages to 'fit' other cultures and might invalidate the experiences of traditionally underserved populations, cultural grounding engages the target audience by calling upon them to articulate their own meaning, codes, and identity (Hecht and Lee 2008). These culture-centered approaches emphasize the need to understand how participants articulate health by engaging in dialogue and mutual understanding, and stress the importance of addressing social, cultural, and environmental factors beyond a biomedical model (Dutta and Basu 2008;Thomas et al 2004).…”