Kirsten Ostherr
Biographic Data
| ID | 277349 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Kirsten Ostherr |
| GIVEN NAMES | Kirsten |
| FAMILY NAME | Ostherr |
| SIGNATURE | OSTHERR K |
| AFFILIATIONS | Rice University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6425-9527 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 12 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 12 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2002 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Emerging infectious disease outbreaks and real-time health communication: Intermediality, Uncertainty and Dissent
This article maps out the challenges of public global health communication in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic by providing an overview of the shifting media of health communication from the post-Second World War era to the present. The article explores the communication of science in real-time or live media of film, television, video and digital social media during three emerging infectious-disease (EID) outbreaks to place COVID-19 health co…
The Afterlife of Data
The future of translational medical humanities: Bridging the data/narrative divide
This essay argues that emerging forms of translational work in the field of medical humanities offer valuable methods for engaging with communities outside of academic settings. The first section of the essay provides a synthetic overview of definitions and critical engagements with the concept of 'translation' in the context of medical humanities, a field that, in the wake of the COVID pandemic, can serve as an exemplar for other fields of the h…
Artificial Intelligence and Medical Humanities
The use of artificial intelligence in healthcare has led to debates about the role of human clinicians in the increasingly technological contexts of medicine. Some researchers have argued that AI will augment the capacities of physicians and increase their availability to provide empathy and other uniquely human forms of care to their patients. The human vulnerabilities experienced in the healthcare context raise the stakes of new technologies su…
Reflective Writing about Near-Peer Blogs: A Novel Method for Introducing the Medical Humanities in Premedical Education
Narrative analysis, creative writing, and interactive reflective writing have been identified as valuable for professional identity formation and resilience among medical and premedical students alike. This study proposes that medical student blogs are novel pedagogical tools for fostering peer-to-peer learning in academic medicine and are currently underutilized as a near-peer resource for premedical students to learn about the medical professio…
How Do We See Covid-19? Visual Iconographies of Racial Contagion
Contagion media have historically performed the dual functions of scientific and ideological persuasion, often deploying an iconography of racial contagion that combines these two functions. In efforts to halt the spread of the virus, health, science, and media organizations create visual imagery to teach the public to imagine we can see and therefore avoid contaminants that are invisible to the naked eye. Comparison of COVID-19 with other global…
The Shifting Aesthetics of Expertise in the Sharing Economy of Scientific Medicine
Argument The deficit model of science communication assumes that the creation and dissemination of knowledge is limited to researchers with formal credentials. Recent challenges to this model have emerged among “e-patients” who develop extensive online activist communities, demand access to their own health data, conduct crowd-sourced experiments, and “hack” health problems that traditional medical experts have failed to solve. This article explo…
Applied Media Studies
Applied Media Studies: Theory and Practice
Trust and privacy in the context of user-generated health data
This study identifies and explores evolving concepts of trust and privacy in the context of user-generated health data. We define "user-generated health data" as data captured through devices or software (whether purpose built or commercially available) and used outside of traditional clinical settings for tracking personal health data. The investigators conducted qualitative research through semistructured interviews (n = 32) with researchers, h…
Operative Bodies: Live Action and Animation in Medical Films of the 1920s
This article examines the role of animation in early instructional medical films through close analysis of the films produced by the collaboration between the American College of Surgeons (ACS) and Eastman Kodak in the late 1920s. The ACS placed medical motion pictures at the center of surgical training and thus established moving images as fundamental to the practice of medicine. These films made extensive use of animation to present surgical se…
Cinematic Prophylaxis: Globalization and Contagion in the Discourse of World Health
A timely contribution to the fields of film history, visual cultures, and globalization studies, Cinematic Prophylaxis provides essential historical information about how the representation of biological contagion has affected understandings of the origins and vectors of disease. Kirsten Ostherr tracks visual representations of the contamination of bodies across a range of media, including 1940s public health films; entertainment films such as 19…
“Invisible Invaders”: The Global Body in Public Health Films
Contagion and the Boundaries of the Visible: The Cinema of World Health
Kirsten Ostherr received her Ph.D. in American Civilization at Brown University in May 2001. She is an assistant professor of English at Rice University, where she is revising her manuscript “Cinematic Prophylaxis: Globalization and Contagion in the Audiovisual Discourse of World Health” for publication
Trust and privacy in the context of user-generated health data
This study identifies and explores evolving concepts of trust and privacy in the context of user-generated health data. We define "user-generated health data" as data captured through devices or software (whether purpose built or commercially available) and used outside of traditional clinical settings for tracking personal health data. The investigators conducted qualitative research through semistructured interviews (n = 32) with researchers, h…
Contagion and the Boundaries of the Visible: The Cinema of World Health
Kirsten Ostherr received her Ph.D. in American Civilization at Brown University in May 2001. She is an assistant professor of English at Rice University, where she is revising her manuscript “Cinematic Prophylaxis: Globalization and Contagion in the Audiovisual Discourse of World Health” for publication
How Do We See Covid-19? Visual Iconographies of Racial Contagion
Contagion media have historically performed the dual functions of scientific and ideological persuasion, often deploying an iconography of racial contagion that combines these two functions. In efforts to halt the spread of the virus, health, science, and media organizations create visual imagery to teach the public to imagine we can see and therefore avoid contaminants that are invisible to the naked eye. Comparison of COVID-19 with other global…
Contagion and the Boundaries of the Visible: The Cinema of World Health
Kirsten Ostherr received her Ph.D. in American Civilization at Brown University in May 2001. She is an assistant professor of English at Rice University, where she is revising her manuscript “Cinematic Prophylaxis: Globalization and Contagion in the Audiovisual Discourse of World Health” for publication
“Invisible Invaders”: The Global Body in Public Health Films
Cinematic Prophylaxis: Globalization and Contagion in the Discourse of World Health
A timely contribution to the fields of film history, visual cultures, and globalization studies, Cinematic Prophylaxis provides essential historical information about how the representation of biological contagion has affected understandings of the origins and vectors of disease. Kirsten Ostherr tracks visual representations of the contamination of bodies across a range of media, including 1940s public health films; entertainment films such as 19…
Operative Bodies: Live Action and Animation in Medical Films of the 1920s
This article examines the role of animation in early instructional medical films through close analysis of the films produced by the collaboration between the American College of Surgeons (ACS) and Eastman Kodak in the late 1920s. The ACS placed medical motion pictures at the center of surgical training and thus established moving images as fundamental to the practice of medicine. These films made extensive use of animation to present surgical se…
Applied Media Studies
Applied Media Studies: Theory and Practice
Trust and privacy in the context of user-generated health data
This study identifies and explores evolving concepts of trust and privacy in the context of user-generated health data. We define "user-generated health data" as data captured through devices or software (whether purpose built or commercially available) and used outside of traditional clinical settings for tracking personal health data. The investigators conducted qualitative research through semistructured interviews (n = 32) with researchers, h…
The Shifting Aesthetics of Expertise in the Sharing Economy of Scientific Medicine
Argument The deficit model of science communication assumes that the creation and dissemination of knowledge is limited to researchers with formal credentials. Recent challenges to this model have emerged among “e-patients” who develop extensive online activist communities, demand access to their own health data, conduct crowd-sourced experiments, and “hack” health problems that traditional medical experts have failed to solve. This article explo…
How Do We See Covid-19? Visual Iconographies of Racial Contagion
Contagion media have historically performed the dual functions of scientific and ideological persuasion, often deploying an iconography of racial contagion that combines these two functions. In efforts to halt the spread of the virus, health, science, and media organizations create visual imagery to teach the public to imagine we can see and therefore avoid contaminants that are invisible to the naked eye. Comparison of COVID-19 with other global…
Reflective Writing about Near-Peer Blogs: A Novel Method for Introducing the Medical Humanities in Premedical Education
Narrative analysis, creative writing, and interactive reflective writing have been identified as valuable for professional identity formation and resilience among medical and premedical students alike. This study proposes that medical student blogs are novel pedagogical tools for fostering peer-to-peer learning in academic medicine and are currently underutilized as a near-peer resource for premedical students to learn about the medical professio…
Artificial Intelligence and Medical Humanities
The use of artificial intelligence in healthcare has led to debates about the role of human clinicians in the increasingly technological contexts of medicine. Some researchers have argued that AI will augment the capacities of physicians and increase their availability to provide empathy and other uniquely human forms of care to their patients. The human vulnerabilities experienced in the healthcare context raise the stakes of new technologies su…
The future of translational medical humanities: Bridging the data/narrative divide
This essay argues that emerging forms of translational work in the field of medical humanities offer valuable methods for engaging with communities outside of academic settings. The first section of the essay provides a synthetic overview of definitions and critical engagements with the concept of 'translation' in the context of medical humanities, a field that, in the wake of the COVID pandemic, can serve as an exemplar for other fields of the h…
The Afterlife of Data
Emerging infectious disease outbreaks and real-time health communication: Intermediality, Uncertainty and Dissent
This article maps out the challenges of public global health communication in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic by providing an overview of the shifting media of health communication from the post-Second World War era to the present. The article explores the communication of science in real-time or live media of film, television, video and digital social media during three emerging infectious-disease (EID) outbreaks to place COVID-19 health co…
Medicine (9 works) · Sociology (7 works) · Art (6 works) · Computer Science (5 works) · Empathy and Medical Education (5 works) · Narrative (5 works) · Political science (5 works) · History (4 works) · Law (4 works) · Literature (4 works)