The course has a two parts:

1: Understanding Addiction

In the first part of the course, dominant models of addiction and substance dependence will be examined in detail. The focus will be on how they constitute addiction as a disorder and how this connects with notions of rationality, desire, freedom and the nature of the human body. We will investigate the continued debates about ‘what' addiction is and what these debates reveal about medical science and conceptions of health. We will also examine the role of public health in the management of drug use and different approaches to treatment and policy. This part of the course concludes by looking at the contested validity of non-drug addictions, with sex addiction as the case study. 

2: Rethinking Gender and Drugs

In the second part of the course, students will be introduced to the idea of alcohol and drug use as socio-cultural practices which occur within specific social contexts. Gender will be the central theme while the significance of  race, age and class in structuring patterns and experiences of drug use will also be explored. Anthropological, sociological and historical perspectives on the relationship between gendered identity and drug and alcohol consumption will be investigated.  This part of the course will conclude with an examination of the genre of addiction autobiography, drawing on texts by both men and women. How do personal accounts of addiction and recovery construct the meaning and experience of drug and alcohol problems?

This course will count as a core course in the Gender, Sexuality and Culture major and in the Health, Medicine and the Body major