This is a great read by a UW Madison professor!

This intimate and richly contextualized study of medical education in Malawi paints a vivid picture of how western medicine is being taught, internalized, adapted and owned by African medical students and physicians. Wendland begins by describing the role that medicine has played in Malawi’s history; the detailed and nuanced picture provides the reader with a deep understanding of a particular African reality, as well a framework for viewing the role of medicine in other African settings and globally. Wendland follows the students from their villages and and preparatory schools, through their academic training, and on to their first days of service in African hospitals. This journey provides insight into how the students experience the promise of medicine, as well as it’s shortcomings, and also shows how they bring their own history, culture, and life experience to their medical practice. The work is further enhanced by first person narratives of the medical students recorded during their training and early years of practice, as well as several case studies of patients that illustrate the fullness and power of viewing health and disease through an anthropological lens. Wendland’s evocative prose and unflinching self-awareness complement these other elements, making “a heart for the work,” an example of medical anthropology at its best. — L. DiPrete Brown, October 24, 2010