Josiah Nott
Biographic Data
| ID | 416618 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Josiah Nott |
| GIVEN NAMES | Josiah |
| FAMILY NAME | Nott |
| SIGNATURE | NOTT J |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Edinburgh |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-6795-5942 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 11 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 18 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 11 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2018 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
Beyond the Demographic and Health Survey
box At the start of 2025, the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) programme was paused due to the defunding of USAID, illustrating the fragility of the international data infrastructures on which many national health systems rely
A treatise on all the bad habits of mankind’
As Britain’s first professor of epidemiology, Major Greenwood (1880–1949) is an important figure in the formalisation of British epidemiology. His contribution derives less from enduring methodological innovations than from his advocacy for analytical statistics in medicine; his analytical focus on health at the population level; his emphasis on the social and environmental determinants of health; and his capacity to translate these ideas for gov…
Economical epidemiology, pathological populations, and the long history of the Demographic and Health Survey
This article examines the history of population health surveillance in modern Africa, considering the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) programme as a bridge between twentieth and twenty-first century epidemiology. Tracing this tradition of surveillance from pre-war Britain, through its extension into the British Empire, and its subsequent employment in post-colonial demography, this article makes two related arguments. The first, that surveys …
Wonder Foods
Material History, Historied Materials and the Question of Epistemic Freedom in Ghana’s Medical Schools
Medical schools rely on a wide range of tools, technologies and materials for their teaching, on books, and bodies, and on the buildings which house them. This article considers the histories of this material culture in the three oldest medical schools operating in Ghana today. Borrowing theoretical concepts from Science and Technology Studies, medical anthropology and postcolonial political economy, this article takes that the material culture o…
Teaching the normal and the pathological
That pathology and normality exist on a complex spectrum of bodily manifestation is an enduring problem at the heart of the philosophy, anthropology and history of medicine. As the primary locus for the reproduction of medicine, medical schools are important sites for cultivating knowledge of what is normal and what is not. Here students come to engage with the slippery concepts of normality and pathology in collaboration with a wide range of edu…
Architecture for Anatomy
Medical schools are among the most important spaces for the history of the body. It is here that students come to know the anatomical bodies of their future patients and, through a process of cognitive and embodied practice, that the knowing bodies of future clinicians are also shaped. Practical and theoretical understandings of medicine are formed in these affective and historied buildings and in collaboration with a broad material culture of ed…
The Guts of the Matter
Sticky models
This paper explores the material histories which influence contemporary medical education. Using two obstetric simulators found in the distinct teaching environments of the University of Development Studies in the north of Ghana and Maastricht University in the south of the Netherlands, this paper deconstructs the material conditions which shape current practice in order to emphasise the past practices that remain relevant, yet often invisible, i…
No one may starve in the British Empire”
Throughout the twentieth century it was widely assumed that African diets were grossly deficient in protein, that childhood protein deficiency was a natural result of this generalised diet and that a relative lack of meat and milk went some way to explaining African economic underdevelopment. This article explores why these conclusions took hold; the European deification of animal protein in previous centuries; structural changes to African diets…
"How Little Progress"? A Political Economy of Postcolonial Nutrition
No one may starve in the British Empire”
Throughout the twentieth century it was widely assumed that African diets were grossly deficient in protein, that childhood protein deficiency was a natural result of this generalised diet and that a relative lack of meat and milk went some way to explaining African economic underdevelopment. This article explores why these conclusions took hold; the European deification of animal protein in previous centuries; structural changes to African diets…
"How Little Progress"? A Political Economy of Postcolonial Nutrition
Teaching the normal and the pathological
That pathology and normality exist on a complex spectrum of bodily manifestation is an enduring problem at the heart of the philosophy, anthropology and history of medicine. As the primary locus for the reproduction of medicine, medical schools are important sites for cultivating knowledge of what is normal and what is not. Here students come to engage with the slippery concepts of normality and pathology in collaboration with a wide range of edu…
Architecture for Anatomy
Medical schools are among the most important spaces for the history of the body. It is here that students come to know the anatomical bodies of their future patients and, through a process of cognitive and embodied practice, that the knowing bodies of future clinicians are also shaped. Practical and theoretical understandings of medicine are formed in these affective and historied buildings and in collaboration with a broad material culture of ed…
Sticky models
This paper explores the material histories which influence contemporary medical education. Using two obstetric simulators found in the distinct teaching environments of the University of Development Studies in the north of Ghana and Maastricht University in the south of the Netherlands, this paper deconstructs the material conditions which shape current practice in order to emphasise the past practices that remain relevant, yet often invisible, i…
"How Little Progress"? A Political Economy of Postcolonial Nutrition
No one may starve in the British Empire”
Throughout the twentieth century it was widely assumed that African diets were grossly deficient in protein, that childhood protein deficiency was a natural result of this generalised diet and that a relative lack of meat and milk went some way to explaining African economic underdevelopment. This article explores why these conclusions took hold; the European deification of animal protein in previous centuries; structural changes to African diets…
Sticky models
This paper explores the material histories which influence contemporary medical education. Using two obstetric simulators found in the distinct teaching environments of the University of Development Studies in the north of Ghana and Maastricht University in the south of the Netherlands, this paper deconstructs the material conditions which shape current practice in order to emphasise the past practices that remain relevant, yet often invisible, i…
The Guts of the Matter
Material History, Historied Materials and the Question of Epistemic Freedom in Ghana’s Medical Schools
Medical schools rely on a wide range of tools, technologies and materials for their teaching, on books, and bodies, and on the buildings which house them. This article considers the histories of this material culture in the three oldest medical schools operating in Ghana today. Borrowing theoretical concepts from Science and Technology Studies, medical anthropology and postcolonial political economy, this article takes that the material culture o…
Teaching the normal and the pathological
That pathology and normality exist on a complex spectrum of bodily manifestation is an enduring problem at the heart of the philosophy, anthropology and history of medicine. As the primary locus for the reproduction of medicine, medical schools are important sites for cultivating knowledge of what is normal and what is not. Here students come to engage with the slippery concepts of normality and pathology in collaboration with a wide range of edu…
Architecture for Anatomy
Medical schools are among the most important spaces for the history of the body. It is here that students come to know the anatomical bodies of their future patients and, through a process of cognitive and embodied practice, that the knowing bodies of future clinicians are also shaped. Practical and theoretical understandings of medicine are formed in these affective and historied buildings and in collaboration with a broad material culture of ed…
Wonder Foods
Economical epidemiology, pathological populations, and the long history of the Demographic and Health Survey
This article examines the history of population health surveillance in modern Africa, considering the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) programme as a bridge between twentieth and twenty-first century epidemiology. Tracing this tradition of surveillance from pre-war Britain, through its extension into the British Empire, and its subsequent employment in post-colonial demography, this article makes two related arguments. The first, that surveys …
Beyond the Demographic and Health Survey
box At the start of 2025, the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) programme was paused due to the defunding of USAID, illustrating the fragility of the international data infrastructures on which many national health systems rely
A treatise on all the bad habits of mankind’
As Britain’s first professor of epidemiology, Major Greenwood (1880–1949) is an important figure in the formalisation of British epidemiology. His contribution derives less from enduring methodological innovations than from his advocacy for analytical statistics in medicine; his analytical focus on health at the population level; his emphasis on the social and environmental determinants of health; and his capacity to translate these ideas for gov…
Medicine (6 works) · Law (4 works) · Law (4 works) · Political science (4 works) · Sociology (4 works) · Colonialism (3 works) · Epistemology (3 works) · Philosophy (3 works) · Philosophy (3 works) · Politics (3 works)