Despite impressive advances in digital communication and remote work in virtual spaces, much of our lives cannot escape bodily constraints. We are always located in some place in the world, need food and water, have varying physical abilities that change as we age; we are prone to illness, and have to move around to access services. In other words, we are still physically engaged in and dependent on our environment. Bodyscapes (people and experience) investigate conditions and experiences of our lives. Our sheer presence, health, nourishment, and well-being all center on our bodies.
CLASS ACTIVITY: To better understand health issues in the context of globalization, you can explore the discussion exercise we have used in our Middlebury College course IGST 101 “Introduction to International and Global Studies” in Spring 2025. (You are free to reproduce or modify it with attribution)
In-Class Exercise: Data Visualization and Health Policies
As the late Hans Rosling’s brilliant TED talk about HIV reveals, data visualizations provide powerful insights into disease and health. The purpose of this exercise is to use cartographic visualizations and the data software package Gapminder World, to get a better understanding of the vectors that influence different disease and health challenges and to outline potential responses to them.
Students will work in groups on the following health problems: tuberculosis, cancer, obesity (BMI).
To begin:
- Consult a map for your topic (see below)
- Open Gapminder World (http://www.gapminder.org/world)
- Click on “How to use” at the top and watch the 2-minute video
With your partners, please use Gapminder World to do three things:
- identify the most significant correlations of socio-economic factors related to your health and disease challenge
- try to explain these trends and forecast the future
- develop suggestions for policies
You might find it helpful to select a few sample countries from your map that exhibit high or low incidences of your health challenge and then trace them in Gapminder World to see if there are correlations between your health challenge and other data (e.g. income, health care spending, etc.). The reading by Patrick Kelley offers context and background on health policies.
How does your study compare to that of Hans Rosling on HIV?
