Social Science

The Archaeology of American Medicine and Healthcare

Editorial: University Press of Florida

ISBN: 9780813079257

Pub: 2025-02-02

In this book, Meredith Reifschneider synthesizes archaeological research on healthcare and medicine to show how practices in the United States have evolved since the nineteenth century. Tracing the areas of medical science and healthcare professionalization, alternative medicine, healthcare consumerism, and public health reform, Reifschneider shows how historical archaeology—which draws on information from the material record, archival sources, historical documents, and ethnographic research—can provide important insights into healthcare and modes of self-care in the past.