Therapeutic landscapes the dynamic between place and wellness: Allison Williams (Ed.); University...

At the same time that Testing Women.... contributesto anthropological discourses on the cultural construc-

tions of science and technology, it reveals some of theprocesses through which genetic literacy in the US isproduced and how race, culture and class are implicated

in its production. Rapp shows that reproductionprovides a powerful lens for illuminating processesinvolved in the perpetuation of social stratification.Through this analysis of the narrative accounts of those

whose lives are affected by fetal diagnosis throughamniocentesis, we learn about this technology’s trueimpact on those who participate in its development and

deployment, those who use and refuse it, and, perhaps,most importantly, on our own cultural conceptions of

who we are and will become.

C.H. BrownerDeptartment. of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences,Center for Culture and Health, University of California,

Los Angeles, CA 90024-1759, USAJill Shapira

Deptartment. of Anthropology, Center for Culture and

Health, University of California, Los Angeles,CA 90024-1759, USA

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Therapeutic landscapes the dynamic between place and

wellness

Allison Williams (Ed.); University Press of America,New York, 1999, pp. 249, price $34.50 (paper)

One of the most original recent developments inhealth geography has been that concerning research on

therapeutic landscapes. Ideas about therapeutic land-scapes are of special interest for several reasons. First,they have the potential to improve our understanding of

how and why aspects of places are important for humanhealth, as well as the characteristics of individual people.Work on therapeutic landscapes has, therefore, made asignificant contribution to research concerning the role

of place in health variation, which has been animportant theme in health geography in the 1990s.Secondly, unlike much ‘health’ research, which in

fact focuses on illness and death, much of theemphasis in studies of therapeutic landscapes is on morepositive aspects of health such as wellness and

well-being. The field is one which offers particularlyrich territory for exploration at the interface betweengeography and psychology and mental health, which issomewhat underdeveloped compared with the large

amount of work relating to physical diseases andthe physical and material dimensions of risks tohealth.

For these reasons, the collection edited by Williams isa welcome addition to the literature. The book bringstogether a collection of papers on therapeutic land-

scapes, including some previously published as journalarticles. By collating ten different contributions byvarious authors the book performs a particularly useful

function in illustrating various theoretical perspectiveson therapeutic landscapes, illustrating these with diverseexamples including studies of wildernesses and naturereserves to residential communities, health care spaces

and urban street life. The organization of thesecontributions, discussed by Williams in her introduction

to the book emphasises in particular three aspects ofwork in this field. A group of papers (including work byBell, Palka, Thurber and Malinowski) explores thehealing and restorative dimensions of therapeutic land-

scapes, with an interesting predominance of studies ofnatural landscapes. The second group of papers (byGeores and Gesler, Parr, Bridgeman) concentrates our

attention particularly on the perspectives on therapeuticlandscapes from the viewpoint of marginalized groups insociety. These highlight the variable ways that those in

different social positions respond to their environment,and also the processes by which dominant social groupsoften impose on others their own sense of what istherapeutic, thereby sometimes exacerbating social

exclusion of less powerful groups. In the last section ofthe book, the metaphoric and symbolic dimensions oftherapeutic landscapes are explored in papers by Kearns

and Barnett, Scapacci and Mohan which also bring outthe differences between the functions of certain conceptsof therapeutic landscapes and local places in the

promulgation of political ideology relating to healthand healthcare.Overall, therefore, the book is interesting for the way

that it illustrates the ‘dark’ side of the application ofideas concerning therapeutic landscapes, involvingprocesses of political manipulation and social exclusion,as well as the potential to inform positive and beneficial

health outcomes.

Sarah Curtis

Deptartment of Geography,Queen Mary and Westfield College,

University of London,Mile End Road London E1 4NS, UK

E-mail address: s.e.curtis@qmw.ac.uk (S. Curtis).

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Book reviews / Social Science & Medicine 53 (2001) 147–149 149