The Great Pox, Symptoms, and Social Bodies in Early Modern Spain

This article explores the social and cultural meanings attached to the poxed body through an analysis of Spanish medical, literary, and patient sources. How was the poxed body understood in everyday contexts? How did social concerns affect medical discourse on the disease? What strategies did the ill use to navigate the socially-charged repercussions of visible symptoms? Ultimately, patients developed techniques of obfuscation and ambivalence to manage the social framing of their diseased bodies evident in medical and popular literature.
Source: Social History of Medicine - Category: History of Medicine Authors: Tags: Original Articles Source Type: research