Moving for Cures: Breast Cancer and Mobility in Italy

ABSTRACT

I combine the theoretical tools of medical anthropology and the framework of mobility studies to explore the intranational movements of women with breast cancer from Southern and Northern Italy. Differences include patients’ technical and moral evaluations of doctors, that influence the patients’ definitions of cure and illness experiences through their mobility and immobility. These (im)mobilities are, in turn, linked to the material and symbolic inequalities between Southern and Northern Italy and to the stigma attached to the south. These (im)mobilities suggest the need to further articulate the concept of cure.

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© 2019 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC

ITALIAN ABSTRACT

Combinando gli strumenti teorici dell’antropologia medica e il quadro teorico degli studi sulla mobilità, in questo articolo esploro i movimenti intranazionali delle donne con cancro al seno del sud e del nord Italia. Le differenze includono la valutazione tecnica e morale che le pazienti fanno dei medici, la quale influenza la definizione della cura e dell’esperienza di malattia delle pazienti attraverso la loro mobilità e immobilità. Queste (im)mobilità sono a loro volta legate alle ineguaglianze, simboliche e materiali tra il nord e il sud Italia e allo stigma legato al sud. Queste (im)mobilità suggeriscono la necessità di articolare più in profondità il concetto di cura.

KEYWORDS:

• Italy
• breast cancer
• cure
• illness experience
• inequalities
• mobility

PAROLE CHIAVE:

• Italia
• cancro al seno
• cura
• esperienza di malattia
• ineguaglianze
• mobilità

Acknowledgments

I wish to thank Anne M. Lovell, Ilana Löwy, Carsten Timmermann and Djordje Sredanovic for their precious comments and suggestions on previous versions of the article; all shortcomings remain obviously mine.

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Additional information

Funding

The data here presented are the result of a research funded through an SHS scholarship of the Cancéropôle Île-de-France; I further benefited from a Barbara Rosenblum Dissertation Scholarship for the Study of Women and Cancer of Sociologists for Women in Society for further analyses of the data. This article was finalized while I was a Newton International Fellow of the British Academy at the University of Manchester.

Notes on contributors

Cinzia Greco

Cinzia Greco is a Wellcome Trust Fellow at the Centre for the History of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Manchester. She specializes in the study of cancer and has further research interests in medical innovation, inequalities in access to healthcare, and gender and health. She is the recipient of the 2016 Barbara Rosenblum Dissertation Scholarship for the Study of Women and Cancer.