Historically Black Howard University and Georgetown University are collaborating to establish a center for medical humanities. The Georgetown-Howard Center for Medical Humanities and Health Justice will focus on reducing health disparities in Washington by leveraging methods of critical inquiry at the heart of the humanities. The center is being funded by a $3 million grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
Medical humanities is an interdisciplinary field that recenters health in its broader social, cultural, and historical context. Bridging the clinic and the archive, it uses humanities and social sciences methods to explore, analyze, and critique the contexts of illness and health. Disciplines represented include history, literary studies, philosophy, bioethics, cultural studies, religion, psychology, medical anthropology, and the visual and performing arts.