Rudolf Virchow Award

The Rudolf Virchow Awards are annual American awards in anthropology.

The Rudolf Virchow Awards are given by the Critical Anthropology for Global Health Study Group, a special interest group of Society for Medical Anthropology. The professional award honors an article and the graduate and undergraduate student awards, a paper written in the spirit of Rudolf Virchow, that is deemed by the judges to best reflect, extend or advance critical perspectives in medical anthropology. These are materialist approaches that emphasize the social and political economic nature of health, disease and healing, and which embrace both micro and macro perspectives.

Rudolf Virchow, a German physician writing during the 1800s, was a key founder of social medicine. In addition to writing in the areas of anthropology and medical science, his contributions to social medicine centered on his recognition of the multiple interacting factors, particularly social factors, that produce disease and illness. He argued that the difficult circumstances and deprivations of the working class increase susceptibility to disease as well as to higher mortality rates. Virchow also recognized the political and material circumstances that inhibited disease prevention efforts and viewed advocacy as an essential part of medical research. He was perhaps most articulate about the limitations of medical science to improving health in the absence of material security. Virchow viewed the state as responsible for providing that security through employment of those who could work. His appreciation for the complex relationship among health, medicine and society are remembered in his statement, “Medicine is a social science, and politics is nothing more than medicine in larger scale”.

The professional award is given annually for an article, singly or co-authored, and published during the previous year in either a peer reviewed journal (either a print or on-line journal) or an edited volume. This prize will be given to professionals, or to graduate students who have singly or co-authored the published their work.

The graduate student award will be granted to a paper that was written in the prize year or the preceding year and that has not been subjected to the process of editorial review. Papers that have been submitted to a journal or edited volume, but that have not yet benefited from review, may be included in this category. Theses and dissertations cannot be accepted. However, a summary of a thesis or a dissertation (no greater than about 30 pages) that can stand on its own, or a chapter that has been revised and can also stand on its own, will be considered for this award. Papers from students who have graduated after the paper was written will still be accepted under this category. Only papers, not interactive media, will be considered for this award.

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